The Fox's Lament
by SkullFox
Summary: Three years after his untimely death, Lylat still grieves the loss of Fox McCloud. And one vixen turned bounty hunter tracks down his murderer...R&R, let me know how this one feels. rated m for some pretty voilent stuff and a little romance in later chs.
1. Lament

**(This is just another story that was being used as a cure for writer's block...I do this pretty often as a cure, so there may be quite a few of these going around. Disclaimer: I do not own Star Fox, it's logos, characters, ect. Anyhoo please enjoy and give me your feedback...) ****  
**

**Chapter I****: Lament**

**(Orbit around Kew)**

**April 6th 2:44am GST**

A small cruiser class ship, resembling a black arwing, approaches a massive transport ship hovering in Kew's orbit. Behind the controls of the small ship a red-orange furred fox opens a com-channel; his right eye is clouded with blindness, the other is a deep green, a long jagged scar trailed down the side of his face, it stretched from his hairline crossing his ruined eye and ended near the collar of his red shirt. As he patiently steered his ship toward the ever growing ship in the distance his control panel flashed with a new message...a small plasma screen appeared on his HUD, the image displayed was of a white tiger with golden yellow eyes...

"Ah you must be the fellow Garex called in about...Lament was it?"

"That's right..." Lament answered.

"Well you're clear for docking, come aboard so we can discuss the business at hand...I take it you have the money."

"More than enough..."

"Very good then, I'm sure you'll find my merchandise to be of the finest quality."

"So I've heard Mo'jan...did Garex give you my preferences?" Lament asked.

Mo'jan's face grew a bit perplexed, "Yes...you are much like myself. A man of...unique taste. I look forward to seeing you in person."

Lament turned off the communicator on his ship's console and pulled into the massive transport's docking bay. It looked like any other docking bay, several small fighters like his own littered the incredibly large area; he jumped from his ship and from it's cargo bay removed two small weapons, one being a standard blaster which he placed in his usual holster clipped to his right thigh,, the other was a large .50 caliber pistol that sat in a separate holster across his lower back. Over his clothes he wore a long, sleeveless black coat that reached to his shins, it was worn in places showing that it had survived through a great deal of rough situations. He pulled out a small metal suitcase and opened it looking over a massive amount of money, which he quickly looked over before shutting it and making his way to a black female panther waiting for him at the door. On the way across the large room he noticed a familiar ship; it was painted a dark blue and was much larger than his smaller arwing, it was a smaller transport ship...one he'd run into several times before, and didn't really care for the person that owned it for that matter. Lament chuckled a bit to himself...since this person only dealt with female slaves it didn't look too good for the pilot of the particular ship...

The panther at the door greeted him with a slight bow, "Mr. Lament. Please follow me."

Lament did as she asked and followed closely behind her...which gave him a pleasing view of the scantily clad guide. She seemed to be wearing a highly decorated bathing suit, that left nothing about he tempting form to the imagination at all. When he managed to drag his attention away from his entrancing escort long enough to get a glimpse of the finely made vessel. Most of the halls were painted in a light red hue, some kept a more traditional chrome color, long silk tapestries hung from the walls here and there. Eventually they reached a door...

"The Master will be along shortly..." The panther said, "...it would be of great help if you would tell him that I did well in my service."

"Sure...whatever."

The girl dismissed herself and Lament headed into the room...it was massive and filled with what appeared to be cells, much larger than normal, each of which contained a set number or young female animals. As soon as he walked into the room the girls seemed to cringe and fall back to the far wall. He walked from one cell to another, as he did he noticed that the girls were separated into groups based on where they came from. The third cell on the left side of the room housed seven young felines from Kew...

Lament knelt low and grabbed the bars, "Hey...are any of you Tanza?"

A young golden furred lioness quickly looked up towards him, "I-I...my name's...Tanza..."

Lament signaled her over to him, "Your father sent me..."

"What about the others?" She asked looking back toward the other girls.

"I only have enough money for one..."

As he talked he caught something out of the corner of his eye, a few cells away. He stopped his conversation with the young feline and strode over to the suspicious cell; as he saw it's occupant he laughed a bit to himself...

"Hello Kursed."

As he said this a shadowed figure shot out of the shadows and a blue furred vixen slammed into the iron bars reaching for the fox's face. Her hair and fur were both a light blue, a small scar trailed the length of her muzzle starting by her nose and ending near her right eye, at the moment she was wearing the same two piece suit the others were wearing, there was a fiery glint of hatred in her deep blue eyes as she seemed to try to push her body through the bars to get to Lament...

"Just as aggressive as always..." Lament chuckled, "...but I never thought I'd win this easily. How the hell did someone like you get caught up in something like this? Where you kidnapped? Or maybe you just miss having a man to hold onto."

"I came here for the other girls..." Kursed said pulling her arms back into the cell, "...he just caught me in the act. What's your sorry ass excuse? Couldn't get a woman on your own time so you decided to buy one."

Lament chuckled a bit to himself, "Mmmm...okay now that hurt. If you must know however, I'm here for a Kewian girl who's father sent me." He said, "It's odd...I never really questioned why you hadn't tried to kill me again in two months...Guess I was just enjoying the peace and quiet."

"So...what are you going to do then take the girl and leave?"

"Wish I could..." Lament replied, "...but as much as I hate having one, my conscience wouldn't allow it. I wish I could just leave your ass sitting in that cell too...but..." He looked into her eyes and smiled, "I seem to have grown fond of your attempts on my life. So...what do you say to a truce? I'll get you out of that cell, and we'll get these girls the hell out of here."

Kursed looked at him accusingly, "What would a sick son of a bitch like you do that for?"

"Look as much as I hate to admit it...I hate slavers far more than you. To a certain extent you can actually be tolerable. You got a clue where your spear is?"

Kursed still wasn't sure if she could trust the one person in the universe she actually hated, "You know that this won't last. Eventually we'll fight again, and I will kill you next time."

As the two talked the doors opened, "Just tell me..."

"Okay..." She whispered, "...it's on my ship. Hidden in a small compartment behind a photo on the wall in my room. The access code to the door is 48-117-63..."

Lament stood and approached the white tiger that entered the room, the same one from the communicator on his ship. He wore a gold colored 3-piece suit and the panther from earlier was holding onto his left arm...his personal slave girl. As Lament approached them he let out a long-winded yawn which caused his eyes to water a bit...

"Sorry...but I could use a wink or two..."

The tiger had a very pleasant smile on his face, "Quite alright...if you'd like you can wait until a later hour to make a choice. My ship has many opened rooms for my customers who have traveled a far distance to get here...Have you made a choice?"

"I've narrowed it down quite a bit...but..." Lament stood beside the tiger and looked toward Kursed, "Cerinians...they're incredibly rare..."

"Ahhh...hahaha...you..." Mo'jan said shaking a finger at Lament, "...you have exquisite taste. Expensive taste as well. She is most likely the last of her kind. That constitutes a high price..." He side rubbing his thumb across his middle and index finger.

Lament opened the metal case which seemed to mesmerize the tiger, "Money is no option to what I'll make off of her..."

Mo'jan thought to himself for a moment before closing the case and taking it, "This shall suffice for a down payment..." He said handing the case to the panther girl, "...Rea here can show you to a room for some rest."

"Good...I'll go to my ship in the morning and transfer the remaining sum from my checking account..." Lament said.

"I hope it's not from a personal account..."

"I'm much smarter than that..." Lament laughed, "...I have a separate account for such...purchases."

The three walked out of the room together, "I hope this is only the first of many times we do business my friend..."

** (000) **

Kursed sat in her cell thinking to herself; she still didn't like trusting Lament. She wished with every bit of her soul that she had had her spear at that time, she'd have killed him without a second thought. It was thanks to him that she never had the chance to apologize, to go back. She swore that she'd kill Lament four years ago when she first heard the news, all of Lylat took McCloud's death hard but it was especially hard on her. Her last words to him were so full of anger and hate that it pained her to the point of tears merely thinking about it. She still swore to herself, wiping away a few tears as her memories began to get to her, that Lament would die for taking Fox's life...and she'd do it as slowly as possible.

As she went through her normal routine of exercises, she looked herself over...she doubted Fox would recognize her even if he was alive to see her. Her hair reached below her shoulders, she'd purposely covered the white patches of fur on her arms and thighs, not to mention the large scar on her muzzle, and her much more sculpted body. She cursed at herself mentally as her thoughts of Fox kept creeping back into her mind, she could never explain it but just seeing Lament's face...hearing the bastard's voice forced the memories to come back. When she finally couldn't take the memories any more she lay on her small bed and cried herself to sleep...a quiet, dreamless sleep, was her only haven from the constant memories...She only hoped that once Lament was dead that the memories would go away...

** (9:27am Lament's Room )**

The room provided to Lament, to him at least, was a bit classy. It was highly decorated, like an expensive hotel; clean soft linens, a personal shower room, even a small bar, which he clearly helped himself to. He was actually waiting for a decent hour to go to his ship where he'd sneak onto Kursed's ship and take her spear, alone he knew that Mo'jan had a lot of men hidden on the ship somewhere, and that he had little chance of doing this alone...but he'd witnessed Kursed's fighting skills first hand, all he needed to do was get her out of the cell. The whole situation didn't sit right with him...he knew that Kursed very well might turn on him as soon as she got out of the cell...he never did know why she was so hellbent on killing him, possibly just another pay day for the bounty hunter. Fortunately she had more reason to go after Mo'jan than him at the moment, after all she tracked Lament down all the time trying to kill him in various manners...she could find him again. His thoughts forced him to break into the small bar again...he couldn't remember the last time he trusted anyone. It never did sit well with his old teammates, what he did to Fox McCloud...but he felt it was a necessary step to take. Then again it didn't sit well on his mind either...it was what drove him to drinking to be honest...the scotch however didn't help.

He eventually set the half drank glass of scotch aside and headed out toward the docking bay. He noted how odd it was not seeing any guards...he figured in this type of business Mo'jan should be surrounded by guards. He got to his ship and fixed the transaction with the account number given to him by Mo'jan's panther girl Rea. He still didn't feel right as he began to punch in the code to Kursed's ship...He kept feeling like he was being watched for some reason. He found her small transport to be slightly bare...no painted walls they were all chrome, and no decorations at all. He went through about three rooms before he found the one that was most likely hers...The only differences between her room and the others was a single small, framed picture on the nightstand next to the bed. He examined the photo; it was of her, though obviously from some time ago, she was wearing jeans and a red t-shirt, she was apparently being held by someone bridal style but, his part of the photo looked like it was severely worn like someone had dropped water on it and tried to wipe it away too often causing it to blur horribly, only she could really tell who it was after all she was in the photo. He set it down and turned to face the wall across from the foot of her bed, there was a painting in a wooden frame of a lone fox standing on a hill in the sunset, his face was turned toward the sun. He slid the picture to one side, inside was the small golden weapon topped with a crystal and an elaborate headpiece, a 6 inch double sided blade stuck out of the headpiece. In it's current position the weapon was no more than a foot or so long, but he'd seen it extend to about five feet in length before...when they first met and she'd given him a large scar on his back with it. He carried a weapon of similar style though his was a sword once used by the people of Katina, It had a slightly long blade that was rather thin but, well made, it's slightly curved blade ended at an angled point...most of the time he carried it with him but, at the time he figured his guns were a bit less obvious as his sword was not easily concealed.

Outside of the ship he found that there was someone waiting for him Mo'jan was standing there with a slightly displeased look on his face...

"If I knew no better...I'd say you were snooping around."

"You've got it all wrong...You do know who this ship belongs too." Lament said.

Mo'jan laughed lightly, "You've run into Kursed before haven't you?"

Lament ran his finger along the scar on his face...

"I thought you might know who you were buying in there..."

"Well originally I had my heart set on a nice little kitten..." Lament smiled, "...but I just couldn't resist having my arch enemy delivered to me for a fair price. I believe the rest of my payment should have been delivered to the account we agreed on. And if possible, I've always liked this ship..."

Mo'jan smiled as he looked over the ship, "Join me in the galley for lunch so we can discuss the ship...of course coming from such a previous owner it my exact a price."

"Once again...money is not an option..."

As the two walked out the door Mo'jan rested an arm on Lament's shoulder, "Lament...my friend you're a fox after my own heart."

** (000)**

At the very least Kursed was able to say that the girls were taken care of, the food was edible and for the most part tasted good enough, they weren't tormented or mistreated,..then again who wants to pay for damaged goods. She didn't eat everything just enough to keep up her strength. As she ate she kept thinking to herself; **The bastard's just playing with my head. He'd never help me. How can I trust him after what he did to Fox? Or after all the times I've tried to kill him. **She couldn't believe that Lament would just grow a heart all of a sudden, he had some sort of hidden motive. She didn't think that it was to kill her, he'd never shown interest in chasing after her before, and his alibi was pretty solid...any parent would pay a great deal of money to get their child out of such a place, and she could bet that he probably increased the price to a ridiculous amount...

"Probably asked for the money in advanced so he could take off with the money if he changed his mind about the job." She said to herself.

Somewhere in the back of her mind she prayed that he'd come through the door, ready to let her out of the cell she was kept in. She'd decided some time ago that once she got loose she'd kill Mo'jan in the absolutely most obscene manner possible, she wanted him to die, completely without dignity. She'd lost count of the time she'd been in the cell but, she guessed that it was like Lament said about two months. Mo'jan had at one point tried to as he put it 'tame' her...but he found she was far too unruly. That was when she was fitted with a small device that was strapped to her neck, the compliance collar would allow the wearer to be shocked into submission. Most people were a bit hesitant to buy a slave with one of these collars on as they often proved more trouble than their price was worth.

When the doors opened her heart nearly stopped...even though she was for the most part left alone, she wanted out. Most of the girls were at some point during their stay violated in some way by one of Mo'jan's nearly unseen guards...or to a lesser extent the tiger himself. The guards gave up their attempts on Kursed after the first one, a wolf, was carried out of the cell, bleeding heavily from an understandable part of his anatomy. Her face was covered in blood when they found her...she'd bitten his manhood completely off...not surprisingly no other, not even Mo'jan himself dared try anything afterward. Even though she knew that Lament might be in the room she couldn't help but to smile at the memory of the wolf's screams...but the smile faded as the two approached the cell door. She mimicked her actions earlier swiping her claws at Lament's face through the bars which was missing by no less than an inch...

Mo'jan let out a fit of laughter, "You weren't kidding...she doesn't seem to like you at all."

Mo'jan pulled out a small remote a pressed a small button, Kursed let out an involuntary cry as her body tensed up, which suddenly stopped allowing her to fall limply to the floor gasping for air... "There you are my friend..." He said handing Lament the remote, "...I believe this is yours now. If at any time she gets too unruly hold the trigger for...three seconds should do it."

Kursed followed patiently in front of Lament on the way to the docking bay...there they stopped in front of Kursed's ship.

"So have you thought up a figure for the ship?" Lament asked.

Mo'jan thought it over for a brief moment, "Well it is a T-76 class Transport, they're pretty old...sooooo...say, 600..."

"600k huh?..." Lament said to no one in particular, while scratching his chin, "...deal...but I'd like to see a bit more of the interior, if that is alright with you."

"YesYes...of course...the girl should pose no problem with the remote in your hand."

They all walked into the ship and Mo'jan showed Lament around, after a bit the tiger stopped and showed himself to a bathroom. Kursed took this opportunity to put a hand on Lament's shoulder. She was hit by a sudden shock from the collar and stepped back a bit...it was a light shock. Lament quickly turned around, he was biting his lip to keep from laughing, while Kursed looked like she was going to attack him...

"You knew from the second he handed me this remote I had to use it at least once."

"Just take the damned thing off..." She growled.

Lament walked over to her and began to examine the collar closely, Kursed was a bit uncomfortable with him being so close to her face, but now she was sure that he had set their differences aside for at least the time being. He seemed to be getting impatient...

"Christ...how the fuck?"

Kursed was becoming impatient with the whole thing until she heard a light snap and the collar fell to the ground. She rubbed her neck in relief, the thought flashed through her head for a moment to attack Lament...but so far he'd kept his part of the deal...

"He's all yours..." Lament said holding out her spear which she hastily took and extended to it's full length, she looked as though she had almost lost an old friend.

Before she could turn to Lament, the fox was already gone...he'd kept his part of their deal...and at the moment was headed to the cells where the girls were held. He walked from cell to cell using his blaster on the doors and removing the collars one at a time...he was forced to cut them off with a small knife he carried. After setting a group free he sent them to Kursed's ship, then he'd move to the next group...as he released the last girl from the last cell she cried out pointing toward the entrance. Lament turned quickly pulling his blaster; the two guards that rushed through the door were instantly dropped by the shots that ripped through their faces. As Lament rushed down the hall with the last two girls in front of him, a man's loud scream echoed through the ship...Lament had no idea what Kursed had done to Mo'jan but the scream was enough to tell him that it wasn't too pleasant. As he rushed onto the docking bay he pointed out Kursed's ship to the last girls and started to run to his ship...something tripped him...

He rolled to his side just in time for the blue furred bounty hunter to land driving her spear into the ground. A Manariki chain **(ninja bolas)** was wrapped around his ankles, he rolled onto his neck and used his hands to toss himself back onto his feet...Kursed swung her spear at him at full length, it barely missed slicing his shirt, she then thrust the spear at him but Lament preformed a quick handspring backward kicking the weapon out of her hands. Kursed recovered the weapon and turned to find that Lament now had the seven foot chain in his hands, spinning one of the weighted ends while the other hand held the other end of the chain. Kursed lunged at him but was forced to roll away as the chain struck the metal floor spraying sparks in all directions...unfortunately Lament whipped the chain's end into her ankles sweeping her off the ground and onto her back. The chain came down toward her face but was blocked by her spear which became entangled in the chain. With all the force she could muster she rolled to one side which caught Lament off guard slamming him into the floor. Unfortunately as she stood the chain was still tangled about her, Lament pulled the chain as hard as possible; Kursed spun into the air from Lament's strength as the chain was pulled free, she hit the ground with a heavy thud. The side of her head struck the floor with a powerful force rendering her unconscious, as Lament stood over her he pulled his pistol instead of his blaster...but as he pointed the gun at her face he heard the guards coming down the hall. He made a quick motion and fired at the door's lock system causing the heavy doors to the docking bay to slam shut, then looked at Kursed who was coming to...

"Your lucky day gorgeous..." Lament said rushing off toward his Arwing, "...thanks for the chain toots these are hard to come by."

As Kursed rolled onto her stomach and picked herself up she saw him getting into his Arwing...he did not board it in the traditional fashion however running across the low hanging nose of the craft and preforming a sort of spinning handspring off of one hand landing him perfectly into his seat. He smiled and winked at Kursed as the cockpit drew shut over him...just before his ship shot out of the docking bay Kursed produced a small object which fired a small disk that lodged into the ship's paneling. She was pissed off that she'd lost him again but there were more important matters at the moment, plus she'd just hit his ship with a tracking disk she could find him later. Kursed picked up her weapon and rushed off toward her ship making sure all of the girls were on board before jetting out of the docking bay...She may have missed an opportunity to kill Lament but she had all of the girls...it was small consolation but she'd at least get paid extra...


	2. A Slight Setback

**Chapter 2**: A Slight Setback

**(April 6****th**** 1:32am GST)**

**(Kew City) **

Kursed was happy to be in a hanger again, and mainly to be wearing her standard uniform; a light blue suit of armor that resembled a vest it was lined in white, the leggings to the armor covered her thighs, and her belt held a white sheet of cloth that hung to her shins front and back, the cloth was embroidered with gold needlework, her long boots covered her shins up to the knee, they were made of the same armor, and perfectly matched her bracers. Her hair reached down to her lower back and at the time was tied in several places with small white bands, her weapons were hidden about the uniform in several places, her spear was at her side at all times strapped to her thigh. The girls's parents all seemed to pitch in on her reward, she was also assured that the girls that did not live on Kew would be taken home ASAP she took her reward and headed back to her ship that was soon enough flying through space once again. Her ship was a welcome sight, she was in a hurry to get to the bridge; the bridge of her small ship was a larger room, rounded with computer panels everywhere and on large viewing window, a single padded chair on a swiveling stand graced the middle of the room. A large bipedal robot named CAM was working over a command console...

"CAM get a fix on that tracking device...I want to know every move that son of a bitch makes." She said as she plopped down in her seat.

CAM went to work on the small computer for a moment, "Target moving toward large Dreadnought class cruiser situated at a point approximately 209.5526 light-years from our current location."

"Good. Set us a course for that location..."

"Object no longer located in that region of space..." CAM replied, "...Isolated warp jump, destination unknown."

"SON OF A BITCH!!!" She screamed in frustration slamming her fist into the arm of her chair denting the armrest.

"Long range scanner have traced the tracking device to the outer rim of the Lylat system..."

Kursed stopped for a moment, "Moving or stationary?"

"Target is stationary..."

"Anywhere near a planet?" Kursed asked.

CAM was silent for a moment, "Target near planet Sauria..."

"Then contact the CHSA (Cornerian Hyperspace Safety Agency)...and set up a solid course for Sauria."

**(Meanwhile in orbit above Sauria)**

Lament had already called to his protocol robot to set up a warp jump before he'd ever made it to his ship. Unlike Kursed's ship...his was large; in fact far too much for a single mercenary and a robot. It was a massive ship with powerful weaponry; his arwing was pretty meek in comparison, the large ship was painted black like his arwing, and had small streaks of dark red along the wings, it had four wings in and X formation near the engines an angled neck that led into a small space where the bridge was located, there were a maximum of four decks on the ship. At the time he was busy taking a hot shower, he hated to admit it but the large rooms of his ship were almost the same as the ones he'd seen on Kursed's ship, they were mostly bare. He looked to his left arm where fresh blood had been falling, one of the she devil's attacks had actually grazed him, it wasn't deep but it was enough to make it bleed, the last time he'd been cut by a blade of any kind it cost him his eye...

"I swear that bitch is gonna end up killing me someday..."He said to himself stepping out of the shower and wrapping the wound with a large bandage from a first aid kit he kept in his room, "Well whatever I did to piss her off...at least it'll make her happy when I'm gone...but...I ain't going down without a fight."

He finished bandaging the wound and quickly dressed himself in a pari of black jeans, before he looked to his bed; a large wood framed canopy bed with red sheets and linens, the digital clock on the nightstand read 3:43pm. He noticed that he was a bit bored, and really didn't have much to do until another client called in with another job. And being bored always made him tired...

"MEL...are there any repairs or messages I need to know about?" Lament shouted to the PA system.

The robot's voice came back, "Slight malfunction in the communications system, manual rewiring necessary...no new messages have been recorded."

"Nothing too important then..." Lament replied, "...I haven't gotten a whole lot of sleep lately. Wake me up if anything important happens."

Lament woke up and rolled over to look at his clock...almost 8 o'clock. He put on a black t-shirt and headed toward the kitchen; the kitchen, or galley, was one of the largest rooms on his ship...there were five small round tables in the middle of the room each housing four chairs. It was most commonly used as a conference room where he would meet with his potential contractors, the far wall was entirely made of high density viewing windows. His first stop was to make a pot of coffee. He took a tall mug of coffee and headed toward the bridge, when he reached the bridge the heavy metal doors slid open; the bridge was not as large as the kitchen but, it was still pretty large, a few feet from the door was a set of inclining steps which led to his captain's seat, the entire semi-circular wall of the bridge was made up of multiple viewing windows, there were computer terminals covering the walls, at one of which a tall bipedal robot was working over some program or other...

"So MEL what's on the agenda for tonight?" Lament asked taking a seat in his chair.

"Message recorded at 5:15pm...message from Maxwell Tanner of planet Papetoon. Recall was requested."

"Go ahead and punch him through then..."

"Visual hologram system offline...proceed?" MEL asked in a monotone voice.

"Just do it..." Lament replied.

After a bit of time the system came online with a stranger's voice...

"Mr. Tanner...I apologize for the inconvenience but by imaging system is out..."

"No matter..." The seemingly disembodied voice said, "...It has been brought to my attention that you were the man to call to have a job done."

Lament rubbed his chin, "What kind of job?"

"I need someone taken out."

"I don't do assassinations very often you know?" Lament replied.

"So I have heard..." The voice replied, "...Which is why I've tripled your normal fee."

That hit Lament a little hard, his price for this sort of job was outrageous enough but, to triple it. He didn't like the idea of killing for money...that was why he charged so much, to discourage people from asking when there were far cheaper assassins in the business. He worked it over in his head for a moment 1.3mil...who's life was worth 1.3million credits?

"Who's the mark?" Lament asked.

"His name is Darius Fin..."

"Darius Fin? The newly elected senator on the Cornerian high council..." Lament said in shock, "No wonder why he's willing to pay triple for this ." He finished to himself. "Lets talk about this in person..."

"Good I know a nice little watering hole in Targer City here."

"I'm familiar with the place I'll be there say...1 o'clock tomorrow afternoon."

"It'll be a pleasure meeting you in person Lament...good bye."

He was a bit hesitant to do such a job but, what did he care, the high council of Corneria already wanted him dead, most of the Cornerian alliance wanted him dead, due to the whole incident with him and Fox McCloud. His memories on the subject were as clear as crystal even the parts of the incident that were known only to him. The coffee in his hand needed a refill, so he left the bridge and headed back toward the kitchen, where he decided to go to the fridge he'd left a cherry pie he'd bought last time he stopped for food supplies on Katina. That stop however went bad when someone recognized his face and he ended up ditching half of his supplies to get to his ship, his Arwing took several hits from the Katinan defense systems, but he managed to get away pretty fast. He was busy with his coffee and pie when MEL's voice blared over the PA system...

"WARNING!!! Space craft approaching. Matches that piloted by Kursed."

Lament dropped his cup of coffee and bolted toward the docking bay, "That bitch put a tracker on me I know it."

It took him no time to find the small disc stuck to the bottom hull of his black Arwing just under the nose of the ship. He threw the device to the ground stomping on it...

"MEL give me time to launch my Arwing then get then get the Raven out of here, warp jump to Titania then come back for me in 10 hours." Lament shouted to the PA system as he leaped into the cockpit of his fighter.

"Affirmative...contacting CHSA for clearance."

As Lament launched his Arwing and sped off into the dark void beyond the docking bay doors he could see Kursed's ship as a small fighter launched after him. Though she was a good pilot he'd been in aerial combat with her before and had no fear of her in a ship...but the weapon systems were not fully functional at the time on his arwing so...his only option was to retreat. As his Arwing sped toward Sauria he could see her fighter closing in on his as well as his ship The Raven vanishing almost instantly from sight as it was pulled into hyperspace. As he broke into the planet's atmosphere he noticed that Kursed's fighter was moving at an erratic speed, a trail of smoke was pluming from her right wing. When he saw this Lament nearly turned around...but there was no way his Arwing could make the trip to Titania. He found a nice place to land around Thorntail Hollow, the place hadn't changed much since the last time he'd been there; the dinosaurs were still there, the land was still green, the water in the stream nearby was clean, and thanks to the tropical environment it was also raining...

Lament sighed deeply, "Good thing I like the rain. I guess I'm stuck here for tonight though."

As he made his way into a clearing he could see a large cloud of smoke raising from the direction of Moon Mountain Pass. Kursed's landing couldn't have been very pleasant, but that was her problem not his. He needed a place to sleep for the night, he found an unused cave where he made a fire to dry his clothes, he'd brought with him the emergency rations that were kept in the cargo hold on his Arwing. He checked his wrist communicator as he ate from a mixture of potatoes, bacon, sausage, and eggs. It was 9:30, but for some reason he couldn't help but wonder what had become of Kursed. Was she dead? Dying? Or did she survive the crash? He had to know...

"At the very least this should give me something to do for the next hour or so."

He placed his guns into their holsters and strapped his sword to his side, he was happy to carry it again, and he now wore his new Manariki chain over his shoulder under his coat. He'd been to Sauria a few times before and knew that the Sharpclaw would attack anything, they weren't excellent fighters but they had a tendency to travel in packs. He sighed as he set down his meal and headed out toward Moon Mountain Pass. The trip, to Lament's dismay, was uneventful until he reached the gates to the Pass. A small group of Sharpclaw soldiers had surrounded someone; Sharpclaw were shorter than the other types of dinosaur on the planet, they resembled raptors of all sorts, among the tribes of the planet they were the only to forge elaborate armors and weapons of metal, most carried axes and small shields, not to mention the dagger like carnivorous teeth which were attached to incredibly powerful jaws. As he watched on two of the creatures fell, he was too far away to see where they were hit but, as they fell to the hard scorched ground he could clearly see a stream of blood fly into the air. He approached the fight cautiously but two of the creatures turned and rushed him, their loud clattering armor could have given them away at any distance...The first fell several feet from him with a loud grunt as Lament's blaster tore a hole in the creature's neck where it was not armored, it rolled around for a few seconds holding the wound making a disturbing gargling sound. The second seemed to be a bit smarter protecting it's head with it's sheild, Lament chuckled as he put away his blaster and rested his paw on the handle of his sword that was hidden under his trench coat. As the second Sharpclaw dropped it's defense to swing it's axe Lament strafed the blade to one side; he drew his sword while moving in a fast spin striking the creature across the knees, then the back of the neck, then finally stabbing it through the center of it's back. He kicked the dead thing off of his blade and turned toward the group that had slightly diminished...they'd attacked him, now he had a reason to fight...

As he approached the fight his stride slowly broke into a run, the first of the armored dinosaurs to see him was also the most unfortunate, his blade tore through armor and all rending it's torso in two at the waist, this maneuver placed him in the middle of the circle. Kursed who had been fighting at best she could was distracted by his entrance, she screamed in pain as one of the creatures locked it's jaws onto her shoulder causing her to fall to one knee, the creature released it's grip as Lament's sword pierced it's skull. He wasn't necessarily trying to protect her but...the Sharpclaw weren't exactly his favorite people, on top of that they'd already attacked him and he wasn't in the best of moods today. He drew his sword up and held it at eye level parallel with his shoulder, one leaped at him but the shaft of Kursed's spear slid beneath Lament's arm with a masterful precision driving it's point into the creature's face. One made a motion for the downed vixen but was stopped as Lament's blade tore it's head from it's shoulders, the last two attacked but, the Sharpclaw were nothing if not slow. Lament's attack was swift and deadly to both first removing the arm of the first creature then quickly pulling out his standard pistol, he swayed the attack of the next and quickly placed the barrel of the gun under the creature's chin pulling the trigger. The sound of the bullet striking the creature's helmet as it exited his skull was reminiscent of thunder and nearly as loud as the gunshot itself, the wound had obliterated the dinosaur's face. Unfortunately one of the Sharpclaw had only suffered an amputated arm and retaliated slashing it's axe across the fox's back...the wound instantly dropped Lament to his knees...but as the creature closed in on him he came back up with one of the other Sharpclaws's axes and drove it as forcefully as possible into the creature's chest forcing both himself and the Sharpclaw to the rain soaked muddy ground...

As Lament stood and slid his sword back into it's scabbard he noticed that Kursed had taken quite a bit of damage, her ship in the distance was in shambles...a non-Cerinian never would have survived such a crash. As he checked her over he noticed that she had a broken arm, he wasn't sure but it also looked like she had a broken rib or two, and the wound on her head may have caused a concussion, the bite on her shoulder may have broken something as well. He turned to leave but as he got so far away he could hear her moaning in pain, and with a heavy sigh he returned to her side and carried her back to his little camp in the cave...

"You'd better at least give me a head start for this." He said as he started to carry her toward Thorntail Hollow.

**(That morning...)**

Kursed slowly opened her eyes, she was in a massive amount of pain...and as she tried to sit up something pushed her back toward the ground. Her vision was however so blurry that she could not make out who was forcing her to lay down, the pain she felt was nearly unbearable.

"Don't move..." The voice almost sounded familiar but, it was distorted and echoing, "...you lost a lot of blood, you've got a concussion, and several broken bones."

"Who-who's there?"

"Don't worry about it..." The blur of colors before her said.

It was at his point that she felt the cold air on her bare fur, "Where are my clothes?"

"Right beside you...a lot of those wounds needed stitching..."

Those were the last words she heard before she slipped back into unconsciousness, her memories of Fox were the only ones she could see in the darkness. Their first date, the time spent together...their fight that caused her to leave, and the time he came back for her only to be pushed away. She blamed herself on every level for his death, maybe that was why she tracked his killer so ruthlessly...perhaps killing him would give back a small part of the person she used to be the kind hearted Cerinian named Krystal that seemed to disappear the day Fox died, and seemed to slip further away with every passing day. It seemed like forever that she stayed in that darkness, watching her memories as if they were happening right before her eyes. After what seemed like an eternity she finally opened her eyes.

At first it was too blurry for her to make out her surroundings, her only clue that she was in a hospital bed was the incessant beeping of a heart monitor that was positioned next to where she was laying. Thanks to the morphine being fed through her I.V she felt no more pain. She slowly pulled herself to a seated position, and pressed a button that caused a nurse and doctor to quickly enter the room, they both seemed to be happy that she was actually awake...

The doctor was the first to speak, a leopard in a long white coat, "Miss...can you tell me your name?"

"Kursed...what's going on? Where am I?" She asked placing her hand on her head.

"We have no clue what happened to you...but you are in the First District Hospital of Targer City. You were nearly dead when you got here."

Kursed was having a hard time filtering this out she couldn't recall any of what had happened, "How did I get here?"

"We don't know..." The doctor said, "...you were found on a gurney in the emergency room...but whoever put you there sure as hell saved your life."

"How long have I been out?"

"Three days...as far as we know."

She sat up a bit more, "Can I get you anything?" A vixen in a nurse's uniform asked.

"Something to eat would be nice..." Kursed answered, "...when can I leave?"

"Well..." The doctor said, "...when you got here our main concern was the massive amount of blood you'd lost...so other than a slight hairline fracture on your right ankle you should be able to go as soon as your blood pressure is back to normal."

"How bad am I?" Kursed asked, "With the morphine I can't really feel too much."

The doctor flipped through some of the pages on his clipboard, "Lets see; grade 2 concussion, multiple lacerations and puncture wounds to your left shoulder, two broken ribs, a cracked collar bone, one shattered forearm...both bones, and a hairline fracture on your right ankle...Pretty badly banged up I'm afraid."

"Wow...I wish I could remember what happened."

"Well...I'm sorry to say concussive trauma can lead to slight and temporary amnesia or just blind patches in your memory."

Kursed sighed to herself...**I only remember chasing Lament toward Sauria...then my fighter got hit by something. ****Lament didn't bring me here...did he? Why would he**?She could still remember hearing that voice though**...That voice sounded so familiar...Where have I heard it before?**

The leopard doctor was a bit concerned as the blue furred vixen seemed to be staring into space, "Miss? Are you feeling alright?"

She snapped out of her trance, "Yeah...I'm fine. This is just a little much to take in.'

"Well this was left with you..." The doctor said leaving her with a sealed envelope, "...and I'll be back to check on your progress in...say...three hours. Your food should be here shortly."

As the doctor left the room Kursed removed a small piece of paper from the envelope...

**Hope you're feeling better, your ship is docked in Hanger A-16...PS: can't wait to play our little game again...**

"It was him...Is he obsessed with me chasing him or something?" She asked herself, "Or is that sick bastard getting off on me trying to kill him? How could he kill Fox...then act like this? It doesn't make any sense...Maybe someone around here saw him. Once I get out of this hospital I should check whatever bars I can find...Lament is a bit fond of Scotch."

**(Corneria Lylat Arms Hotel...)**

**(April 10****th**** 2:45pm)**

Lament sat on the leather sofa in his room; it was a suite, with a large queen sized bed with this comfortable linens, a large kitchen area, lovely shag carpeting, a huge plasma screen T.V, and all of the luxuries that Lament liked but wasn't used to. He was amazed that Maxwell had already paid for the room before Lament had even landed on Corneria...of course being in a city full of people that hated him so much he used the alias...Jacob Marely...a name he went by on more than one social occasion. This wasn't just an alias though...for the right price all the proper documents were forged and put into Lylat's database...Jacob Marely was, according to records, a living person born and raised in the heart of Katina City. Lament was still thinking about how often his fake i.d had gotten him where he needed to go...

He held the small card up before sliding it into his wallet, "Best 50,000credits I ever spent."

He'd been there for two days so far; the assassination was set up in sync with a public meeting of the high council, they were to meet in city square, that made Darius an easy target for a high powered rifle. The whole plan was well thought out, Lament could reach the senator from the window of his hotel room, pack up, and be out of the system before anyone even knew he was there. He moved to a telescope at his window as he threw his shirt onto his bed, and peered into the square where several animals were setting up the podium and tables and several banners and a massive amount of chairs which took up the entire square. As he looked he noticed a pretty famous face...

"Well well well...Mr. Falco Lombardi...what's a slapstick GPX racer like you doing out here?"

As he watched the famous blue feathered falcon setting up chairs Lament noticed a pink furred cat rushing up to him, kissing him as she threw her arms around him. As he looked closer it looked like the two hadn't seen each other in some time...He knew the sight of Katt Monroe, he'd met her once some time ago...in fact she'd tried to kill him for what he did to Fox, he had to admit though even through she tried to kill him...he liked her attitude. At the moment there was something different about her though...

"Wow...either she's pregnant...or she really let herself go." Lament chuckled to himself, "The combined attitude of Falco Lombardi and Katt Monroe...there's a lethal combination."

The hit was still not scheduled for three days, plenty of time for Lament to get some much needed rest and to allow his back to heal. The doctor he'd seen had told him that the stitches could come out in about a week, so for the time being he was stuck where he was...but who ever complained about being in a big, expensive hotel room?

**(Targer City, Papetoon)**

**(April 11th 10:25am)**

Kursed was released from the hospital early in the morning and did just as she'd told herself, she checked the local bars for and sighting of Lament. Eventually she found herself in a downtown bar called 'The Pond', it was a rustic little dive; a small white building with a blue roof, it certainly stood out among all the taller buildings. The bartender seemed a bit worried about her being in such a place in her condition but was more interested in what she had to say...

"Yeah Miss...there was a fella like that in here just two...three days ago." The heavy set wolf said.

"You sure it was him?" Kursed asked.

"Oh yeah...there's no forgetting a face like that...pretty nice guy...little fond of Scotch but..."

Kursed almost laughed, "That's him alright. You know where he went?"

"We got into that a bit...said something about visiting an old friend in Corneria City."

"Thank you sir..." Kursed said, "...I've been looking for a clue all morning on where to find him."

"Not a problem Miss...just be careful...you don't look to be in a proper condition for any kind of travel."

"Thanks for the concern..." Kursed replied dropping a few credits on the counter.

She found her ship right where Lament's note had stated, unfortunately as she entered her ship she noticed that her fighter was gone. She knew that she'd crashed but, how bad was the damage? She was tempted to go back to Sauria and check the damage. As she started to limp through the room she noticed a large tarp covering something, she pulled it away to find a perfectly new Arwing with a note on it's hull...

**Don't think this is a freebe I took the money out of your room while you were knocked out...**

She was mad but, at least she didn't have to go through the hassle of replacing the ship herself. She had her suspicions that it may have been rigged or bugged, but at the time she had more pressing matters to deal with, she slowly made her way to the bridge. She instantly set up a warp jump to Corneria, being such a distance from the planet the trip was set at a full 24 hours...

"CAM...check out that new ship in the docking bay for anything unusual. I want an identification scan too, and a registration, I want to know everything about that Arwing by tomorrow morning." Kursed said standing up, "I've got a lot of healing to do..."

As a Cerinian she possessed the distinct ability to heal such wounds as broken bones and minor cuts...but it took a far greater toll on her than most of her other abilities did. She went to her room and sat in the middle of her soft bed where she'd be able to concentrate, her first step was to fix her forearm. She winced as she worked the bandages off of the swollen discolored arm, as she focused all of her healing strength the hand of her undamaged arm became surrounded by a light blue light that danced about like fire...

"Oh god this is gonna hurt..." She whimpered closing her eyes.

As soon as the light touched her busted arm she cried out in pain, mending bones with this ability was nearly as bad as having it broken all over again, it felt like a fire inside, as if someone were welding the bones back together with and arch welder. Five agonizing minutes later her arm was as good as new, though the bruised flesh and bone would take time to heal on it's own. Tears were still streaming down her face and she was breathing heavily, and sweating profusely the worse the wound the heavier the toll to the healing, and her arm had been broken in several places. She took a few minutes to rest and catch her breath before moving to her ankle, she really didn't like being a gimp...she'd have done this sooner but really didn't want to attract all the attention to herself from the doctors at the hospital. Her ankle didn't hurt nearly as much but nonetheless it still brought fresh tears to her eyes. By the time her healing was done her vision was blurring again, she lay her head on her pillow and slipped into a deep sleep to recover her lost strength...

**(5 hours later...)**

Kursed woke up, her vision was still blurry but, her arm and leg were usable once again. It hurt to walk and mover her arm a lot but, it was a bearable pain, a slight sting really...hopefully a hot shower would clear that up though. She almost fell asleep again while she was showering, she had not had a shower in several days she hurried herself in getting dressed; she put on a new bra and panties before putting on a pair of black jeans and a gray tank top. After a bit she headed to the kitchen, healing wounds of any kind always made her hungry, she called CAM on the PA to bring the report on the new Arwing to the kitchen. Kursed had her laptop with her when she sat down to a hot meal, and soon CAM entered the room and dropped off a small disk before leaving. Kursed quickly put the disk into the small computer's CD tray...

"Lets see here..." She said to herself skipping through the data from the diagnostic, "...everything checks out. It's clean...it's better than my old one. So...he's a swordsman, marksman, martial artist, ace pilot, and a great mechanic. Is there anything he isn't good at?" As she said this to herself she noticed something odd about the ship's registration.

The Arwing was registered to one Fox J. McCloud, and Star Fox team, that didn't make any sense...

"But the team had all of our ships decommissioned after Fox died...didn't they?"

As her curiosity built up she accessed the web and looked into any decommissioning records of the team's old equipment. All she pulled up was an old newspaper article...she should have seen it before but she didn't really care for the newspaper so she now read the article intently...

**Great Fox Disappearance...It would seem that bad news comes in large numbers these days. On March 21****st**** of the year 3246, the great hero of Lylat, Fox Jamison McCloud, was shot down over Katina. Three weeks later a ceremonial funereal was held in his honor as no body could be recovered from the scene. On June 8****th**** however another offensive tragedy struck as the Great Fox, which was to be decommissioned and placed in the Cornerian Historical Museum, was stolen from it's hanger. Oddly enough there seemed to be no forced entry...it was as if someone walked into the hanger, slipped past every guard, and managed to launch the ship all by his or her self. Though it seemed impossible for only one person to break into and steal such a massive space craft, one bystander claims to have seen a lone fox wandering around the hanger suspiciously several hours before the ship came up missing. Is it possible that Fox's murderer, this character that calls himself Lament has taken the Great Fox as some sort of trophy? It is the hope of most of the citizens of the Lylat System that this Lament meet justice as soon as possible...**

"That son of a bitch...leaving me Fox's old Arwing like this...probably just doing it to screw with my mind. I'll show him as soon as I get to Corneria." She growled to herself, "He'll pay for everything...it wasn't enough to kill Fox, but he had to steal the only real memory of him from the people that loved him so much."

As the hours passed Kursed got dressed into her uniform and got her things together, she was also forced to go to Lament's lengths to get clearance...being a bounty hunter she was not one of the most liked people in Lylat her id called her Myra Lynn. Like Lament however she had several different aliases in case one became a problem. She could recall every part of Corneria City, there were uncountable amounts of places Lament could be in such a massive city...there was no telling how long it would take her to find him, all she could do was start with a part of the city and move from there...


	3. One step forward

**Chapter 3**: One Step Forward...

**(April 13th Corneria City)**

Kursed made her way from place to place hoping she'd run into one of the aliases of Lament's that she was familiar with. It never even dawned on her that a lowlife like Lament would be staying in the most expensive hotel in the city, she must have passed it at least four times moving from one place to another. Her first places to check were the local bars, she was all too familiar with his love for Scotch, but none of them had seen anyone matching his description. As she made her way from building to building Kursed thought to herself; Lament must be in the city for a job of some sort but, for what she didn't know...She was aware of his hatred for Corneria City and was well aware that it would take nothing short of a job to get him there and a high paying one at that...But luckily for her word tends to get around fast in Lylat, rumors of an assassination attempt had made it to the lower classes of the city. As she blew by a local restaurant she overheard something between a brown wolf and a raccoon...

On catching the word assassination she quickly turned back, "Whoa...excuse me but could you repeat that?"

"What?" The raccoon asked, "About the council meeting? Well word has it that there's going to be an assassination tomorrow during the public council meeting in the square. I personally think it'll be Correl Hashan, too many people don't like his political views."

Kursed reached into her pockets and handed the raccoon a fist full of credits, "Thank you sir."

Kursed rushed out into the square and was appalled by the setup; the massive amount of chairs were set in a semi-circular pattern around the podium and council seats, the entire place was surrounded by tall skyscrapers and buildings...even an amateur sniper could pick any animal he or she wanted out of the thousands and nobody would know where it came from for hours. As she examined the buildings she took record of the ones that posed the best views...Hitting someone from far away wasn't Lament's style but, he'd go to any length to keep the blame from himself, even it he was nowhere near there she had to make sure, she couldn't waste an opportunity to take the fox down. She went from one building to the other looking for any sign of his presence...unfortunately the first building she searched turned out to be an old abandoned warehouse, she was using a cloaking device to keep from being seen, all she found in the building were a few homeless animals and your common pest infestations, the second building in the area was a large restaurant but no reservations had been made by the fox in the photo she had of him...to Lament's bad luck however that last place she searched was The Lylat Arms Hotel. She found the lobby to be incredibly inviting, the carpet was a crimson color with golden etchings of elaborate designs , several indoor plants were scattered about the room giving it a very natural look and feel, a soft music played from speakers in the ceiling. The receptionist was a pink furred echidna, she was dressed professionally, and a pair of small square glasses sat in front of her brown eyes...

"Excuse me but has this person checked into this hotel?" Kursed asked handing the young echidna Lament's photo.

"I'm sorry ma'am but I'm not allowed to give out that information..." The receptionist said in a kind voice.

"Look..." Kursed said with a sigh, "...it's very important that I find this man as soon as possible..."

"Your ex?" The echidna cut her off, her attitude seemed to be against the Lament at this point.

"Yes..." Kursed lied trying to play on the girl's apparent hatred for men, "...he didn't take the news too well when I got pregnant...he's been trying to hide from me."

Those were apparently the right words, as Kursed could have sworn she saw the girls eyes set to flame...

"Oh really..." She growled, "...just so happens I have seen him. Room 615 on the 23rd floor...here's the back up key."

Kursed started off for the elevator before the girl grabbed her wrist, she sat a piece of paper in Kursed's palm and winked before letting her go. She was a bit confused but, Kursed had the info she needed and headed into the elevator across the room. As the lift slowly made it's way past the building's many floors Kursed unfolded the piece of paper and read what was on it...

**Don't be afraid to give it a try...659-7098**

Kursed couldn't really believe what she'd just read, "Is she hitting on me?"

She was flattered...hell even a little curious, but now wasn't the time she had someone to kill. The elevator stopped and she made her way through the halls until she finally came to the room she'd been told she'd find him in...she could hear the constant flow of a shower as she placed her ear against the door. This was her perfect opportunity to get the drop on him. She slid the key through the scanner which beeped to assure her that for the next 30 seconds the door would be unlocked. As she crept slowly into the elaborate room she instantly noticed an archaic high powered rifle laying on the large bed...he obviously wanted to make this messy as hell, a blaster rifle would have done the job just fine...but a rifle of the caliber he was using could literally behead the poor target. It was as she studied the room she realized that due to he quick exit of her ship she was unarmed. Suddenly the bathroom door hissed as it opened, the nude fox emerged with his face buried in a towel as he was drying his face. Kursed, in an instance of desperation tucked and rolled into the lowest compartment of the opened closet just in to her left; the closet was more of a large wardrobe, it had several smaller compartments above her. Her action caused the door to pull itself shut a bit, luckily Lament was drying his face this whole time. Kursed began to panic slightly as he approached the closet and pulled the door open, as he did this there was a knock on the door and Lament turned letting the closet door swing open on it's own...

"Room service..." A voice called.

"Just leave it near the door, I'm not decent at the moment."

Her current position in the closet kept her face parallel with his thighs, which didn't help as his swaying tail kept brushing against her nose threatening to make her sneeze, it didn't help that she could see parts of his anatomy that she wished she hadn't...even though she hated his guts she couldn't help but to stare; she'd not seen a male in some time, and he was rather well built...in more than one way. As she fought to keep herself from sneezing Lament turned to face the closet, this position wasn't much better for Kursed. She tried to move her head further away from the appendage but, the space in the closet was very narrow...She had to turn her head to one side to keep it from hitting the end of her nose. She was relieved when he turned around and slid on a new pari of jeans. As he turned back to face the closet again Kursed noticed something, a scar just above his waist line to the left of his naval, an obvious stab wound, very similar to one she'd seen somewhere before. She was much further relieved when he walked away swinging the closet most of the way shut. He walked to the door where he pulled in a small cart...there were several plates of food, and to no surprise a bottle of Scotch. Lament took several things off of each plate and the bottle and headed back to a leather couch where he turned on a rather large T.V that Kursed could clearly see through the closet door which was only made up of overlapping wooden planks. He flipped from channel to channel until he reached some sort of history channel which brought up a special that Kursed didn't want to see or hear...The Life and Trials of Fox McCloud...

As the two hour show ended Lament said something that was far too muffled and low toned for her to hear. Lament turned off the T.V and started toward his bed taking a very heavy swig from the bottle of Scotch, Kursed noticed that he actually looked depressed, the quickly draining bottle was enough to prove that. There was very little left in the bottle before he set it down and lay down on his bed. Almost another hour went by before Kursed was able to hear him snoring; she stepped out of the closet and looked around...she found that his pistol was on the top shelf of the closet and quickly retrieved it. She slowly crept to his bedside...she'd always been amazed at how much he looked like Fox, but Fox didn't snore, he'd also never lower himself to killing an innocent, especially for money. She set the barrel of the pistol just above his forehead and squeezed the trigger...

**CLICK...**

Though the weapon was silenced there was no sound, no blood, the weapon's magazine was not loaded. It was just then that she looked onto Lament's face as a huge smile spread across his lips. She tried to jump away but she was too late, Lament's powerful paws grasped her wrists and his legs wrapped about her waist. He quickly thrust his weight to one side rolling himself into a sitting position on her waist while pinning down her arms...

"Hello gorgeous..." He smiled.

He placed her wrists together and held them with a single hand while he stripped the weapon from her hands, he chuckled a bit as he ejected the empty magazine...but then to her great fear she heard a new magazine enter the weapon. He placed the corner of the barrel on her temple slowly running it through her fur until it rest between her breasts...

"This one's loaded..."

As he said this she felt a painful burning in her chest...her vision started to blur...after all the chasing and swearing to Fox's memory she'd failed, to die at the hands of the same person that had killed him...

**(Sorry this chapter came up short...but it was supposed to...:-) **


	4. Three steps back

**Chapter 4**: Three Steps Back

**April 14****th**** 10:44am)**

As Kursed opened her eyes the only thing she saw was a bright light, she could hear the light whispers of a thousand voices all at once. As she looked around she noticed that she was no longer in the hotel room, and was surrounded by a dome of light...

"So...this is the other side." She said to herself, "It's a lot less welcoming than I had hoped for."

A vague shape appeared on the outside of the dome, but it was too blurred to make out, "Hello Krystal..." It said in a familiar voice.

"General...Pepper?"

"It's good to see you my dear."

Kursed tried to move but couldn't, "Why can't I move? Where am I?"

"This is the other side...the spirit realm..."

"So am I dead..."

"No...just a near death experience..." Pepper's voice said, "...Krystal this path of vengeance you're on can only lead to more heartache. You must let it go...or you may find yourself in a situation that you cannot reverse no matter how much you may want to. You know that what you are doing is not what Fox would want..."

She tried to reply but her voice was no longer with her...the world of light began to slowly fade. It faded out leaving behind the room that she remembered being in. She had a pounding headache, and her arms and legs were tied to the posts of the bed, she at first thought that she'd been raped but, as she thought about it there was no feeling at the time that would have implied the notion...it also wasn't Lament's style, she was also fully dressed. As she looked around the room she noticed that Lament was nowhere in sight, and the shower was running again, soon enough the fox emerged from the bathroom with a towel wrapped around his waist while he dried his fur with another. He yawned a bit ignoring the vixen tied to his bed and went to the closet where he changed. She was surprised as he walked over and untied her arms and legs. She instantly tried to lunge at him but couldn't even manage to move her fingers. Lament sat down on the side of the bed removing a small dart from her chest, he leaned in close to her face and held the dart up so she could see it...

"Hydroterathinbenzydrene...powerful anesthetic, so powerful that any more than 10ccs can kill you. Fortunately I only hit you with five...the only side effects are pretty minimal, paralysis mainly...something I'm sure you're feeling right now,blurred vision, and can drop your heart rate to a point where most would have thought you dead for at least six hours...you'll recover in a few hours..." He said tossing the dart onto the bed and going to the window.

He was now wearing a pair of black gloves, as a few hours went by Kursed slowly regained control of her voice...

"Why don't you just kill me?" She asked.

Lament, who was staring out the window turned to face her, "Look...you tried to kill me. I never wanted to kill you, and even though I could I don't want to kill you now. I'm gonna finish my job, walk out that door, and eventually have to avoid you all over again."

Kursed eventually found the strength to move her arms again, "And then what? We do this all over again?"

"Until I tire of our little cat and mouse game...yes." Lament noticed she could move her arms and brought a plate of food and set it on the nightstand

Another hour went by and the only part of Kursed's body that wouldn't move was her legs, the meeting outside had started and Lament was a bit occupied with his rifle to notice that she was trying to reach one of his other weapons...

"You know..." Lament said pulling the bolt back on the rifle locking a bullet in place, "...a very wise man once told me something; The right answer without the right question is as useless as a gun without a bullet..." He finished.

She tried to get to him before he could pull the trigger but, the booming gunshot informed her that she was too late. Lament watched as the senator's body was knocked off of his feet by the podium; there was an uproar of panic and screams as a mass of the crowd pointed to where Lament's room was located. Kursed was still having trouble as Lament shuffled about the room gathering his things; he soon was fully dressed in his usual uniform and was standing next to the door. As Kursed looked on from her paralized position on the bed Lament looked to her and tossed the rifle at her...

"Catch!" He said playfully before walking quite casually out of the room and down the hall.

Her instant reflex was to catch the weapon before it could strike her in the face. She kept trying to stand up and finally after several attempts while using the rifle as a crutch she managed to get to her feet. She soon was able to walk again and headed out the door. She ran down one hall but found the police coming up the stairs, she turned and headed down the other hall but found that they had come up through the elevators as well, her only option was to go back into the room. As she backed away from the door she heard the police coming to the door, they knocked several times stating that they were there but, then a much louder sound came from the door as they started to ram it down...

The door finally burst open and four guns were instantly fixed on her, she dropped the rifle...

Unfortunately one officer recognized her face, "It's Kursed..."

**(000)**

As soon as he said this she dropped the gun and ran for the balcony, she dropped into a baseball slide in time to hear the bullets whizz by. She slid between two of the bars making up the railing and as she dangled over the edge she swung herself onto the balcony below. It was a good ten foot drop and hurt her feet and knees quite a bit but, it gave her the time she needed. She walked into the bathroom and changed into a bath robe which did a good job of hiding most of her body from sight...noticing how little this helped she got her face wet and wrapped her hair in a dry towel. She looked into the mirror, now she wasn't recognizable. She walked out of the room and noticed the police hadn't been there yet...just as she began to walk down the hall they rushed the door...to make everything look more convincing she acted like she was coming out of a different room. As soon as the cops were in the room she rushed down the hall and into an elevator. A raccoon from one floor or another was already in the lift; he was pretty well built a bit more muscular than Lament, just not as tall...her telepathy was picking up an odd vibe through...And as the elevator moved from floor to floor she felt his fingers pinch the left side of her ass, but that wasn't something she stood for...even before she became Kursed. The raccoon caught a short glimpse of the white lace panties she wore as her spinning motion caused her robe to fly open, unfortunately that was just as her foot slammed into the side of his head, her spinning back kick drove his skull into the wall...he wasn't dead but, he wouldn't wake up for a while...

As the elevator doors opened she pulled her robe shut, "Prick..." She huffed as she walked out of the elevator.

As she walked into the lobby Kursed noticed that there were guards in front of the door, and her anger escalated as she saw Lament on the other side of the doors, who gave her a small salute before walking away from the building. She looked around the area there was nothing she could do to get through the door, instead she headed back up to the first floor and to the east side of the building and knocked on a random door...

"Room service..." She said in as calm a voice as possible.

She heard someone walking toward the door, "I didn't order any..." The wolf that opened the door cut himself off as he couldn't believe what he was seeing, "...Holy shit...now this room service I like."

Kursed quickly pushed the wolf aside and rushed through his room diving through an open window and catching a street light post, riding it to the ground. Not a soul even saw her vanish into a nearby alley, but she was too late though, she'd never be able to come back to Corneria, she was wanted for murder of a senator...and it was all thanks to Lament. The bastard had killed the senator, gotten away wit it, and set her up all in the same move, it was almost as if he had planned the entire thing. When she reached the hanger she found that all the hangers were being watched...it really pissed her off when she caught a glimpse of Lament drinking some sort of drink while he took some extra time to fix up his Arwing. Now she had another problem, she needed to get to her ship without letting the guards know where she was, she was sure that by now the entire city was searching for her, and the first and foremost place they would search for her would be the Space Ports. As she studied the different hangers all lined up in rows like so many warehouses. The roofs seemed relatively unguarded though...To her changing luck one of the hangers was near a slightly large tree. She waited a bit before climbing the tree and taking a few short steps toward the space separating the hanger from the one next to it.

_'About three meters...that's a pretty good jump.'_

Had it not been for the small two foot barrier that separated her form the launching areas on the roof she'd have easily been spotted getting a running start. She panicked a bit as she made the jump, for a moment it felt like she wasn't going to make it, but she as she rolled onto her back she took in a relaxed breath...

_'Almost...missed...'_

As she finally stood back up, there was the sound of a ship taking off. As it leveled out with her she could see Lament's cocky smile...he gave her a small sarcastic salute before his ship shot into the sky. The sight of him made her blood boil, why was it he always seemed to be a step ahead of her? It was as if he knew her every move. The thought filled her to the brim with anger, an anger which fueled her next building to building jump causing her to land in a running start...she didn't want to waste any time getting to her ship. After a short while of searching she found a small vent system that made for a useful catwalk along the building's interior. Kursed was successful in making it down and to her ship without being noticed. She rushed to the bridge of her small ship and after a brief word with CAM they were in orbit again...scanning the entire region of space for any signs of Lament's ships, for an instant she had him on her scanners, but like last time he obviously had hyperspace clearance ahead of time...

"GOD DAMN IT TO HELL!!!" Kursed screamed in furry slamming her fist into the holo projector who's glass face shattered under the impact. "CAM!!! Where is that ship headed?!"

CAM's reply gave Kursed little hope, "Destination of vessel unknown...registered flight path with CHSA set for restricted access..."

If Kursed knew anything it was when she'd lost, and she'd lost him...but she did know someone that could help, someone who had several times in the past. She could reach him at anytime like he'd once told her. Xander at times seemed to be the only person she could rely on in this modern day, the light brown furred half fox half wolf had helped her track down a few bounties before Fox's death...as the half breed was a friend of Fox's she knew he'd jump at the opportunity to help track down his killer. She sent him a message hoping for a speedy reply but, it often took him a day or two to reply...

She finished with her message, "CAM. What's our status?"

"Current fuel level at 38, recommended refueling at 32. Food stores at three meal daily will last approximately 96hours, Communications imaging device severely damaged replacement necessary...I am also experiencing slight mechanical errors in my mathematical logic circuits...Slight possibility that my accounts are less than accurate..."

Kursed rolled her eyes, and checked the system status for herself...the fuel cells were actually at 27.786 of full capacity...she definitely needed to refuel. As she checked she also noticed that her hyper drive engine was off-line, the only thing mentioned on her screens was that it was an electrical failure of some sort. She didn't like the idea but she had no choice now...

"CAM set a course for Katina...we need to get some work done here."

CAM worked at a console for a moment, "Course set estimated time of arrival..."

"36 hours...we've made the trip before with and without our hyper drive systems..." Kursed pointed out sighing heavily, "...I'm taking a shower. Transfer any transmissions to my bathroom."

**(000)**

After her shower Kursed could think of nothing else to do, she didn't even bother putting any clothes on after drying off, she was too tired to care, and simply lay in her bed. Her thoughts kept going back to that moment in the hotel room, Lament said he had no desire of killing her, was he even aware of why she was after him...what he'd done to her? She didn't care if he was or wasn't aware in the afterlife he'd be forced to deal with Fox himself...Lament would face his demons even if she had to drag him to the afterlife every step of the way. As if often happened her last thoughts of the night shifted from Lament and killing him, to Fox...changing what would have been a pleasant night of sleep for her into a riddled mess of nightmares...


	5. Shadows in the Sand pt 1

**Chapter 5**:**S**hadows in the sand (Part 1)

**April 17th 12:23pm**

**(The Raven in orbit around Sauria)**

Lament has slept in late...it was a luxury he was rarely allowed anymore, either a mission, a problem with his ship, or Kursed found some way of depriving him of much needed sleep. As it were his first stop of the morning...or afternoon, was his morning visit to the bathroom before getting dressed; today in a white tank top and a pair of faded blue jeans. His second stop was in the kitchen for a bite to eat and a cup of coffee...not to mention a nip of Scotch for an eye opener. He soon found himself awake and well sitting in his seat on the bridge...

"MEL system report..." Lament said sipping at his coffee.

"Fuel cells at 84.1164...food stores at 56.68...small non-fatal error in the communications system, error is electrical in nature, reparis advised but not necessary...hyper drive engines are currently at 100 efficiency, life support systems are at 97.226. All systems check out as opperational." The robot answered, "There are currently three messages for you. One from Maxwell Tanner of Papetoon, one whom refused to leave a name, and one from Tyrel Mayson of Tarros-4 in the Dan'jas system."

"Tyrel?.." Lament wondered out loud, "I haven't heard from him in some time...wonder what the sick old bastard is up to...patch him through."

"Com channel unavailable..."

That got Lament's attention, Tyrel was one of his most frequent employers and had a special com channel just for Lament that he never turned off, "Really?...try one of his other channels."

"All com channels under the listing Tyrel Mayson are unavailable..."

"Then set a course for Tarros-4...contact CHSA and get us clearance...If I'm needed just patch all my calls into the docking bay I'm going to work on my Arwing before I get to work on the com systems..." Lament said walking out of the room, "Controls felt really choppy on the way back in from Sauria when I went for supplies." He mumbled to himself as he walked down the hall

**(000)**

Hours passed as Lament found himself working on his Arwing, he'd found that some of the G-diffuser system's relays were a bit off on their calibration, which made perfect sense as they were meant to be checked every year and his hadn't been so in over two. After his work on his Arwing was done Lament headed to the bridge and took about an hour to get his com system's holographic imaging system back online, then took a much needed hot shower. It wasn't too long before MEL's voice called over the PA system announcing that they'd gained clearance to go into hyperspace. Even in hyperspace the trip would take some time, three days tops, Lament waited until he was on the bridge to make the jump. He didn't like the idea of just laying around for three days doing absolutely nothing, his fallback as a cure of boredom was as always his training. Lament owed his life to his training, especially with Kursed on his tail constantly. His training was not light by any manner; he trained every skill he used in a single room with an increased gravity, he trained in a gravity four times that of a normal ship.

By the time he'd been in his personal training room for any more than three hours he was spent. Nobody else in the entire Lylat system, that he knew of, trained with increased gravity but one clear look at his musculature could tell that it was far more than effective. At times he believed that his intense training was the only thing that kept Kursed from killing him, but it wasn't going to work forever...she was getting stronger and more skilled...he knew that eventually she'd finish what she'd started. He had accepted long ago that she'd be the one to end his life but, he also guaranteed himself that he was going to make her life hell on the way. It was like he'd explained to her, he had no intention of killing her, he still didn't understand his own obsession with her chasing him, maybe it was something about a beautiful girl constantly chasing him around the galaxy, or maybe he was just an adrenalin junky caught up in the moment every time she attempted to kill him...or maybe he was just falling for her...

"Nah..." He said to himself shaking his head, "...wonder what time it is." He added turning away from his training gear, "Computer restore gravity to normal."

He picked up his wrist communicator and turned on it's time piece...it was nearly 9 o'clock, he'd been training for over five hours. He rubbed the back of his neck which was pretty sore for the moment, even so he didn't think he was training for as long as he had been. As he stretched his arms over his head a powerful smell wafted past his nose...

"Damn..." He said tuning his face away, "...is that me? I need a shower more now then ever."

**(Meanwhile on Katina...)**

Kursed had no choice but to sleep aboard her small ship as the repair crews fixed whatever was wrong with the ship...and CAM as well. She'd gotten some supplies as well, not much but enough to last a month or so in space. She was very appreciative that the mechanics made their work as quiet as possible while she slept, she'd seen someone in the city that she really didn't want to run into. Why Falco was there she didn't want to know but she knew that he'd bring up more than one question about her disappearance as well as possibly trying to take her in for her alleged murder of the senator. Luckily the lead mechanic of the small group working on her ship seemed to be quite infatuated with her...something she used to the depths of her ability to get her ship repaired faster. To some extent she'd grown to enjoy toying with men's heads, she was after all a very enticing vixen and was well aware of the fact, and how she could use it to her advantage against most men. Even though she'd gone as far as she was willing to go, the mechanic informed her that the repairs would most likely take a few more days, followed by his normal flirting and come ons. Kursed was half tempted to just take him up on his offer for dinner; after all he was a rugged and handsome wolf, he was a gentleman and was very well mannered, though at times he seemed to be a bit shy, in the end her memories of Fox simply wouldn't allow it.

On the night of her second day on Katina Kursed the wolf showed up in the kitchen where she was eating a small dinner to herself...

"Miss..." He said, "...we've finished the repairs on your ship."

"Thank you Teed...I've left some extra credits in a small case in the docking bay for you all."

"You're too kind ma'am." Teed replied using a small rag to wipe away some of the oil remaining on his light gray fur, "You know if you don't mind my intruding...you look like you've got a lot on your mind ma'am."

Kursed chuckled a bit to herself, "Is it that obvious?"

"Well...you have been eating for over an hour and your plate's still full."

"It's this bounty I've been chasing for...well a long time, " Kursed said, "he's stronger than me, a better fighter, and an awesome pilot, but every time he has had the chance he didn't pull the trigger. By my count he could have killed me a dozen and a half times by now, but every time he just walks away."

Kursed had gotten used to talking to the wolf and signaled for him to sit, he quickly did so, "You know my father was a mercenary, and he once told me 'The true warrior is the one who knows when to stay his hand'...perhaps there's more to this person than you first perceive."

"It's the one that killed Fox McCloud..."

Teed nodded slowly, "I thought you looked familiar...you're Krystal aren't you? You know most people in Lylat think you're dead."

"Krystal died with Fox..."

"Well there's your main problem..." Teed said reaching for her hand, "...look, I learned when my wife died that you can't dwell on the past. Not only is it not what Fox would have wanted it will eventually lead to your end, you already doubt yourself and your motives." He stood up and stretched his neck and placed a paw on Kursed's shoulder on his way by, "Do me a favor and get some rest okay? And don't worry your secret's safe with me, my son's probably wondering why I'm two hours late coming home right now."

As he left the room Kursed called back causing him to stop at the door, "Thank you Teed, your wife was a very lucky woman."

"And I was a luck man, even though we were only together six years...the ones you love never really leave...you just need to know where to look for them. Good bye Krystal..." He said walking out of the room, "...and you remember to get some sleep."

After her dinner she decided to go to her room to do as Teed had requested, at the same time giving CAM the order to take off. By the time she got to her quarters the ship had broken the atmosphere, and after a hot shower she changed into a red nightgown...but no matter how she tried she couldn't sleep, Teed's words stuck with her. _The ones you love never leave...you just need to know where to look._ Kursed thought on this for a moment, she decided to meditate on it for a bit at least enough to tire herself out. She sat cross legged at the center of her bed and rested her hands on her knees before taking a deep breath and closing her eyes. As she concentrated all of her thoughts toward Fox she could see a small light in the distance beyond the darkness of her own eyelids. The light closed in on her very quickly...it was just that a large blot of light green pulsating light. As it enveloped her she could feel a hand on her cheek, and a familiar warmth, the familiarity of the feeling brought a slight trace of tears to her eyes...

**But why is the light so dim...it's like he's only half there.** Kursed thought to herself.

After such an experience her sleep was no help, she had a reoccurring dream in which she finally stands off with Lament, but as she watches him die he smiles, as she's struck down from behind...she catches a glimpse of Fox's face just before fading into the darkness and waking up in a cold sweat. Most of the night she spent laying in bed fearing he own sleep, fearing that if she closed her eyes she'd see the one she loved killing her all over again...by the time it was 3 o'clock she finally got some dreamless sleep, since Xander had not answered her call she set a course for Titania where his home was located...she didn't expect to find Arlex there but Xander was always around even if not at home.

**(000)**

For Kursed the days heading toward Titania went by far too slow, like Lament her training was the only thing that ever seemed to ease her mind to any degree...unfortunately like most other things she used to train with Fox so even the act of her daily training brought back painful memories. When she finally found her ship settled above Titania. The barren planet was perfect for Xander as he preferred to be alone and there were few if no in habitants of the planet...instead Xander lived in a large ship orbiting the planet. As Kursed's ship circled the planet she attempted to establish communications with Xander's ship but, as it's last location appeared there was nothing but floating debris...

"Oh my god...CAM give me a report." Kursed said jumping into her seat.

"Dreadnought class ship...registration matches that of the Black Lance...two life pods had been safely jettisoned to the planet's surface...chances of survival on Titania during it's summer months are 46.291 percent. Pod locations locked, at point 32.21 degrees south latitude by 113.22 degrees east longitude. Bio scanners are being disrupted by a passing electrical storm..."

"How long till the storm passes?" Kursed asked.

"Approximately 28 and one half hours...life expectancy in current temperature of 110.46 degrees Fahrenheit...four to five hours."

"I'm going down there to look for them...I'm sure Arlex can handle himself well enough, but Xander's not nearly as tough as Arlex." Kursed said standing from her chair, "If there are any changes call my Arwing...send out a distress signal to any Cornerian ships in the area. Within minutes Kursed's ship was Arwing was headed into the atmosphere of the red planet.

The planet's unstable atmosphere caused her small fighter to shake violently with turbulence, but she soon broke into the sweltering heat of the desert planet the planet was home to some strange life forms , and the masses of ancient ruins littered about the planet suggested that it was, or could still be populated. Though there were no direct records of any animal sightings on the planet. According to some hieroglyphics that Beltino had found on one of the archeological surveys done there...there was at least at one time a race known as the Mashif that lived on the planet. The small escape pods were found exactly where she was told they'd be, the footprints in the sand however didn't look to promising either Arlex or Xander had been injured as one was limping, and judging by the smaller boot print it was Xander who was hurt. To avoid the heat and make the trip shorter she followed their footsteps which were visible at some height, until they suddenly stopped several miles from the escape pods. She landed her ship and leaped onto the soft sand, the heat instantly took her breath away, it took a moment to adjust to the sweltering heat of the planet wide desert. Kursed noticed that off in the far distance was a large oasis to the north, and mountains to the west.

She studied the large imprints in the golden colored sand, judging by their direction they were headed for the oasis in the far distance...but something wasn't right, it was as if they'd both collapsed and were swallowed by the desert itself, as she studied the area she noticed very small prints in the sand, they were almost perfectly covered by the sand. The prints were headed in the direction of the mountains to the west Kursed made it a quick step to board her fighter and fly to the mountainous region. What she discovered was that rather than mountains the hills she'd seen were parts of what was once an elaborate ruins that seemed to blend into the surrounding dunes of sand, she soon found the footprints again which led into a large opening in one of the highly carved surfaces, she didn't like the feeling of the place and quickly drew and extended her spear. As she moved about the area she heard something shift the sand behind her, she quickly turned ready to attack but...there was nothing there. Again the sands shifted behind her causing her to turn, every time she'd face the direction the shifting sound came from she found nothing. Suddenly her right thigh began to burn causing her to cry out in pain, she looked down just in time to see what looked like a scorpion's tail vanish into the sand...she couldn't move and her vision was now merely a vague blur of color, she felt her heart slow down and finally fell face down in the sand. A moment later she managed to see a set of stubby black legs, and heard the sound of small snaps and clicking sounds...she could feel herself being dragged along the ground just before she blacked out...

**(Sorry this is so short compared to most of my stuff...I've been job searching so that's been eating up a lot of my time...anyhoo I'll try to post a bit more often...Oh and I do not own Star Fox, it's characters or anything else of the relative nature...R&R...and thax for the support people."**


	6. Shadows in the Sand pt 2

**Chapter 6**: Shadows in the sand...(Part 2)

**(The Raven in orbit around Sauria..)**

April 18th 6:23am

Lament was a bit upset, the CHSA had been experiencing technical problems and his patience was wearing thin. He hardly had a decent sleep through the night, and he felt like something was happening to Tyrel. He had never had to wait any more than three hours before getting clearance for hyperspace He did as usual that morning; shower, coffee, then to the bridge. It was there that he realized that something was not right as he looked over his laptop and punched up the most recent messages left on his system only to find that there were two.

"Lets see..." Lament said as he read out loud, "...Dear sir, we regret to inform you and your crew that we at the CHSA are experiencing technical difficulties with our navigation network systems, at the moment there can be no safe course plotted through hyperspace all travel is at this moment restricted, but soon enough our systems will be back online...thank you for your time..."

Lament managed to suppress the urge to tear the screen off the device, "Fine...fuck you too then..." He said to nobody in particular, "...what the hell?"

To Lament's great surprise the second of the messages was part of a distress call, "What the hell is this all about MEL? Why didn't you wake me up for this distress call?"

"You specifically ordered that you not be disturbed during your sleep."

"Fair enough..." Lament said, "...where did it originate?"

"Distress signal sent from a point in orbit around planet Titania...time of 8:26pm galactic standard time." MEL replied in his monotone voice.

"Well I guess it's better than just sitting on my thumbs all day...never know when these lame bastards will get their systems back online plot a course for Titania, as fast as we can travel without breaking into the hyperspace engines."

"Trip estimated at four hours..."

"Then lets get to it..." Lament said.

**(000)**

The hours seemed to fly by and soon Lament found himself looking out at the surface of the famous red planet. It was one of the only planets in the Lylat system that were deemed uninhabitable, Lament didn't take any leisure, he made it his way to the docking bay and boarded his Arwing and shot out of the docking bay. A short while out he contacted MEL...

"MEL...send any messages to my Arwing I'll check 'em on my way back."

Lament set his scanners to pick up any downed ships on the planet's surface, he managed to pick up three small distress beacons on the planet's surface. When he landed he found Arlex and Xander's escape pods; nearby were footprints headed north, and there were more near tracks that implied an Arwing had landed. He leaped back into his fighter and headed for the third beacon. Lament was surprised to find a lone Arwing not far from some large stone ruins. He landed nearby and checked over the small ship; it was the Arwing that he had left to Kursed, but according to the control console it's last flight was...yesterday.

"That's not right...she doesn't stay on solid ground that long." Lament said as he said this something flashed in the sunlight near the entrance to the ruins...he rushed over to the object, "What the fuck is going on here?" He asked picking up a golden spear from the sand, "Kursed wouldn't leave this laying in the sand,..."

He pulled his sword slowly...

"Hang on..." Lament said, "...she's better than that. How did they sneak up on her?"

Lament's ears perked up as he heard something shifting the sand behind him, he didn't turn to look rather he concentrated on the sound, following it with his ears. He couldn't pinpoint whatever it was, it kept moving. After about two minutes the sound vanished. Lament looked around in all directions, but there was no more sound...within an instant he heard the sound near his leg but, quickly reached down grasping something tightly. His instant reaction was to thrust his sword into the dirt where the thing in his hand had protruded. A small black thing burst from the sand screeching horribly with Lament's sword driven through it's chest...the creature thrashed about for a moment before the life left it's body. Lament looked over the creature; it had rubbery black skin, almost no face, with large with large white slits for eyes. It's scrawny arms were tipped by seven fingers each tipped with sharp hooked claws, it had webbed toes which were tipped by the same tearing claws, it was wearing a cloak made of tattered black cloth, the thing he still held in his hand turned out to be a tail like a scorpion's, it was at least six feet long. "The hell is this thing?" He asked himself removing his sword and poking at it a few times, "Well better safe then sorry."

Lament rolled the thing up in a spare blanket he kept in his Arwing's cargo bay, at the least it would make for an interesting study piece later on. He took a deep breath before moving into the darkness of the ruins; their insides were like a deep cave, a small halogen light on his shoulder was his only light source. Soon he heard footsteps coming toward him and shut off the light and hid against the wall. Two of the freaky little monsters passed by. When they were out of sight Lament flipped open the screen on his wrist communicator and set it to scan the area for any type of signal from another communicator...there wasn't a smart person alive in Lylat that didn't wear one while traveling in space. He was lucky to learn that there were in fact two active...his problem now was finding his way to the area. He found his way down most of the halls without any problems, eventually hiding from passing creatures as they came. After a bit of time the dank musky smell of the cave was joined by a much more familiar smell, a smell that followed a certain blue furred bounty hunter. The sent led him through the halls one by one until he found a small room where there was a single cell of some kind, what would have been iron bars before was made up of stone. There seemed to be no use of any guards, but how did they get the prisoners inside? As he approached a single black furred fox leaped up as if to protect someone...

"You alone in there?" Lament asked.

"No...there's an injured wolf in here, and a poisoned fox."

"How bad's the poison?"

"It's not good...she's got a high fever." The almost invisible fox said.

"Then we need to get her out of here fast..." Lament said attempting to move the bars, "...damn...how do I open the cell?"

"I don't know I was unconscious when they brought me in here...they seem to be practically blind in sunlight...so if you find yourself in trouble shine your lamp in their eyes. They're also none too smart..."

"How do you figure?"

"Our weapons are still in here...they never took them."

"Well...then they're either stupid...or they just don't know anything about weapons..." Lament said, "...I'm hoping for the first opinion myself."

"You and me both...you got a plan?"

Lament studied the stone pillars for a moment, "Stress fractures...a loud enough blast of sound could rip these things apart." He passed Kursed's spear through the bars, "If they come in here for any of you hold them off till I get back."

Lament rushed out of the cave as quickly as possible only to find that he'd been traveling for some time as night had set in. A bone chilling cold set in with the shadows of night, Lament went to his Arwing's weapon storage...a smaller cargo bay near the back of the ship...where he took out several small concussion grenades, not nearly powerful enough to be considered deadly but would provide more than a powerful enough blast to destroy the stone bars on the small prison that held the three captured animals; he turned to face the ruins again only to see three of the small figures like the one he'd killed cocking their heads as they studied him...He doubted that the clicking sounds he was hearing were coming from their mouths as he doubted they had mouths. He was proven wrong however as the one in the middle let out a vicious hissing sound, as it's massive mouth showed several rows of lethal fangs...

This motion startled Lament into drawing his sword... "Why do I always get drug into THIS SHIT!!?" He shouted rushing them.

The first of the three leaped at him with an unusual speed but, it's path was stopped as it's flying body collided with the blade of Lament's sword splitting it's short torso in half, a deep green liquid sprayed from the wound covering both Lament and a good portion of Kursed's nearby Arwing. The motion didn't slow Lament's advance the slightest bit as he continued to charge forward lashing out at the other two with a spinning motion as he dropped from a powerful jump. The first of the two dropped vanishing into the sands, the second however wasn't so lucky. The thick red stained blade of Lament's sword tore into flesh and bone spreading the creature's chest open like a finely honed scalpel, spraying Lament in blood as it's entrails spilled onto the sand. Lament looked about for the third but, he'd lost track of it after it dove into the sand vanishing like a shark below the waves. As he kept his senses on end searching for the creature something burst from the sand several feet to his left, as it flew by his back he felt the stinging pain of the creature's claws tore several cuts into his back. The creature circled around again leaping out of the sand striking his right arm this time, unfortunately after the fourth pass Lament had studied this attack pattern long enough. Lament ducked the next attack and thrust his sword upward, The creature's path plowed itself into the blade, it's body only made it half way through until the blade became lodged into something pulling the blade to the ground with the body. It's tail, which had been wrapped around it's waist began to flail about wildly. Lament dislodged his sword and wiped the blade clean before sheathing the weapon...

Lament ran his fingers over the cuts on his arm, "Damn those claws cut deep...this is gonna need stitches."

**(000)**

There was no more interruptions between him and the cell where he found several of the creatures dead lying outside the cell. Neither Lament or the still conscious fox inside said a word, Lament set a single grenade at the base of the stone bars. Arlex pulled the other two to the far wall and covered his own ears, Lament set a small timer on the device and backed into the hall. The grenade didn't quite explode; rather a concussion grenade simply emits a sound wave strong enough to not only render one unconscious but if you were a ways from the blast it could also throw off your equilibrium as well. The lightly muffled boom wouldn't have been perfectly audible but, the shaking it caused in the caves was perfectly noticeable, but the bomb had done it's job the bars were totaled...

Lament rushed inside and lifted Kursed onto his back, "You gonna be alright?" He asked noticing that Arlex was a bit off balance.

"I...I..I'll be fine..."

"Good. Then grab your friend and lets get the hell out of here. These bastards may be as blind as bats but their hearing is just as good too."

As the two rushed through the halls Arlex pulled out in front of Lament and began to overtake him in their footrace out of the cave. "Just get to one of the Arwings outside! I'll meet you in orbit!" Lament yelled.

As Arlex vanished into the darkness of the caves something whizzed by Lament's ear, these things had some sort of weaponry but thanks to the pitch black, and his unwillingness to turn around he couldn't see what it was, luckily when he was at his Arwing he had devised a little 'surprise' for the little freaks. The standard grenades around his belt were all held on by a pull string...which when pulled would remove the pin from all ten of the highly explosive devices, while at the same time dropping them all to the ground...it was a trick he'd come up with to get out of a foot race, and it had saved his ass more times than he cared to count. As he approached the entrance of the caves Lament took the cord to his grenade trap in his hand...

"See if you can keep up with this, you ugly little fuckers!" He shouted yanking the cord.

He could hear the grenades falling behind him and tossed the cord aside rushing as fast as he could for his safe exit but, he found he'd pulled the cord a bit prematurely. The first explosion threw him off balance a bit, the explosions were a fraction of a second apart, and each one amassed a large fireball behind Lament. As he finally found himself near the exit he attempted to dive to one side to avoid the fire that followed him but the force of the blast launched him and Kursed into the air. They both rolled a short distance through the soft sand and Lament noticed that one of the creatures had also attempted to outrun the fireball...to a lesser success than Lament's...it's body was wedged in a mass of collapsed rubble that was now covering the entrance to the ruins. Lament looked to Kursed who was face down in the sand only to rush over and put out small fire at the end of her tail. "Little close for comfort there eh kid?" He asked the unconscious vixen.

Lament noticed that her's was the only Arwing there...**Why'd he have to take mine?**...He thought to himself as he placed his passenger into the vehicle. Lament was happy to set the planet to his back, all of Lylat had registered Titania to be uninhabited. Now the four knew better...

"I don't know about you..." Lament said to the non-responsive vixen as the small ship broke the atmosphere, "But if I ever meet the guy that said this planet is deserted...I'll personally drag his ass down there and leave him there."

Lament activated the small ship's communicator and punched in the com channel of his own Arwing, the small screen before him showed up with a small image of a black fox, his deep blue eyes were strong and piercing...

"Lament...right?" He asked.

"And you must be the famed, Arlex Stone and Xander Cramm...it's a pleasure."

Arlex looked a bit confused, "My question is...why would someone with your reputation help us?"

"Honestly?..." Lament asked, "...It was just to pass the time. CHSA seems to be having some sort of technical problems with their navigation systems so..."

"You know that sounds a lot like someone I used to know...answering a distress signal just for something to do."

Lament rolled his eyes, "Well I'm not one for 21 questions, or lets state the obvious. So...all games aside, you can use the medical bay on my ship to fix these two up...on one condition..."

"And that would be?"

"You know anything about stitches?"

Arlex sighed and turned off the com system...

**(about 5 hour later...)**

Kursed woke up with a searing headache and a burning pain in her right thigh...she was amazingly comfortable surrounded by thick blankets and sheets. It hurt to move for the most part...

"Hey you're awake...looks like that anti-venom worked."

As her sight cleared Kursed saw who was speaking; next to the bed she lay in was a tall, muscular black furred fox, he had long black hair, and dark blue eyes, at the moment he wore a gray tank top and black pants, around each of his powerful biceps was a leather armband hung with small multicolored feathers...

"Arlex? Where are we? What the hell happened?" She asked.

"Someone answered your distress call...one of those creatures down there poisoned you. You're lucky to be alive...our savior managed to collect one of the monsters for study. Xander managed to formulate the anti-venom that saved your life...but it may actually take some time to get some of your motor skills back..."

"Who saved us?..."

Arlex didn't actually give her a name as he knew it would upset her, "Didn't say...he's some kind of researcher and a hell of a fighter to boot."

"I...guess I'll have to thank him then..."

"That may prove to be a bit hard...we're orbiting Katina right now...he says he needs to get somewhere important and that he needs to leave right away." Arlex explained, "At least he brought us and your ship this far though. Xander is on the planet right now sending all of the info he gathered from the body our mysterious friend left with us to the Cornerian Defense Administration..."

"How long before I'll be healthy again?" Kursed asked sitting up as much as possible.

"Xander said you should be able enough for travel and walking around now...but you should take it easy for now for safety sake..."

"What happened to you guys...your ship was just rubble?"

"It's a good thing we have time to spare for this...cause it's a long story..."


	7. The Job

**Chapter 7**: The Job...

**(Orbit around Terros-4...)**

**April 21st 1:20pm**

Lament had already been to the planet...he found what was left of Tyrel's home, it had been both smashed and burned, but there were no signs of his old friend anywhere. He checked the local news and such only to find that there were no leads. Among the rubble one hare was found, the body was determined to be Tyrel Mayson. Lament sat in his chair on the bridge playing his message over and over again looking for something he might be missing, he noticed that Tyrel's voice was shakier than usual, something that he hadn't noticed before. At one point Lament paused the recording to get something to drink...he left the room and made his way to the kitchen returning with a tall glass of Scotch...as he entered the bridge again, he took a small sip of his drink. Instead of sitting down he stood next to the imaging screen and took another drink. As he pulled the glass away from his lips something in the frozen frame caught his eye...

"Hey MEL...get me a closer look at this mirror in the background." Lament said pointing to the image.

As the image of the mirror far behind Tyrel took over the entire screen, it was blurred but, there was someone's reflection in the mirror. "Clear up that image..."

The blurry image was wiped over several time every minute slowly bringing it into focus until the picture was almost clear. He studied the image for a bit but couldn't put his finger on it, the image almost looked familiar.

"MEL...reference that image with all registered people in the Lylat database."

The room went silent for a moment, "Match found...possibility of error 24.228 percent. Image scanned matches the profile of Wolf O'donell..."

"Wow...I didn't even think he was in Lylat anymore...after the Anglar were destroyed Star Wolf disband and Wolf supposedly vanished." Lament wondered, "Why would he kill the old man though? His beef was always with McCloud...maybe it's a military thing. Tyrel did have some connections with Corneria's higher ups...MEL look up any and all articles and news reels that have something on O'donell within the last three years."

"1,587 files found...download time estimated at...3 hours 10 minutes and 40 seconds."

**(4 hours later...)**

Lament had read through every article and watched every news reel that MEL had downloaded, only one seemed to have any significance. One of the articles seemed to dub Wolf some sort of hero in the Danjas system for some sort of harrowing act of bravery...

_Wolf O'donell granted the medal of honor for the death of the famed mercenary Lament. It is rumored that Lament will not be missed as he was wanted in nearly every star system in our brief region of space. Lament's body was brought in and identified through the public databases. His original name was proven to be Jase Tomas. Tomas was known in the Stygian system for the systematic killing of 820 pilots of the Stygian system's best military trained fighters and had at one point stollen and hidden an experimental fighter of the Arwing class that was deemed would change avionics forever..._

Lament read on into an article placed over four months later...

_An anonymous tip recently was brought in claiming that Jase Tomas was indeed__not__ the lone mercenary known as Lament. Wolf O'donell was incarcerated for the spread of a public conspiracy__his sentence has been set for three years...Wolf claims that Jase had gone by Lament when he was taken down but, due to the nature of Jase's capture there is no possible way of filtering lie from truth. Wolf claims that he will not rest until Lament is brought to a stop. Wolf had recently given a powerful, heartfelt speech at the annual celebration in the honor of the late Fox McCloud claiming that "Though he and I were bitter rivals. McCloud had my utmost respect as a man and pilot, and though dying in my Wolfen would be my idea of a perfect death. To be shot down simply for the fame of having killed a famous pilot however, is no way for the great to die." at the same conference he swore that he would bring Lament to justice..._

By the time Lament had read through everything a second time, he found that the bottle of Katinan Scotch on the table was sitting on empty. At some point the Scotch was the only way to keep the thoughts of his tattered and painful past at bay. It seemed like every time he began to call someone a friend they either tried to kill him of they were killed because of him. His vision was slightly off, and he definitely felt a little drunk Figuring he couldn't handle any more history lessons he stood up and attempted to walk out of the room, unfortunately his balance was fucked and as he made it six steps he collapsed to the floor. He decided that it was against his better judgement to get up and instead simply rolled over to his stomach, he took off his vest and rolled it up setting it under his head...

"R..(hic)..R...(hic)...MEL...Sau...(hic)...ria...now..." Lament managed to hear MEL confirm the command before he slipped off to sleep.

**(Orbit around Katina...)**

**April 21st 6:06pm**

Kursed had been searching all the possible databases along with Xander for any information on Lament for the last few days...but nothing came up. Kursed found herself at her wit's end, it was as if Lament had never existed at any point. For today she had started looking over the records at 5 o'clock, finally she gave up and headed for the shower. After about an hour of relaxing in the cascade of hot water Xander's voice came in over the PA system slightly startling Kursed as she was used to being alone on her ship...

"Hey Krys...I mean Kursed. I found something on Lament..."

"And?" She asked leaning against the far wall of her shower.

"The name is more of a legacy...it started back in 2906 when a space pirate named Jarren Lee came up with the name when he left his band to become a traveling thief or...treasure hunter as he called himself. After living as Lament for about a hundred years he found and befriended a lonely youth...He passed the name down to the boy and eventually this boy grew weary of the job and, remembering how it made him feel wanted he found a young man like himself and passed on the name again..."

"So this is why we can't find anything about Lament..." Kursed said pulling her long hair around in front of her taking care in washing it, "...because Lament is just a name...we have to find out who he was before he was Lament."

There was a silence for a moment, "Pretty much...so technically the only way I can help you find out more about this guy is to cross reference him with every missing person in the Lylat system. And if he doesn't match there we simply move on to another star system."

"How soon can you start? I really need some sleep." Kursed asked flipping her hair back behind her.

"I can start right now...but there are over 200 trillion animals in this system alone. Needless to say it could...take a little time."

Kursed stepped out of the shower and began to dry off, "Well you see what you can get done and I'll take over when I wake up."

Kursed didn't even bother getting dressed, her bra and panties were enough for her to sleep in, she didn't really understand why people wore their clothes to be...she knew Fox never did. Her bed seemed to almost beg her to fall asleep as soon as she lay down. She actually found herself enthralled by her sleep as she was not graced with a single bad image or nightmarish vision...for the first time in months she would finally get a peaceful night's sleep.

**(8:15am the next morning)**

Kursed woke with a heavy yawn followed by a content sigh of relief...nothing interrupted her sleep. The only times she recalled having slept so well was when she was on board the Great Fox. She yawned again and turned on the small lamp on her nightstand; she decided against wearing her uniform and instead put on a black tank top and jeans. She staggered into the hall and walked to the kitchen, Arlex was there greeting her with a friendly smile and a cup of coffee, he wore the same thing he normally did, a gray tank top and dark blue jeans with his trademark armbands. Kursed sat down at one of the small tables, while Arlex stood near the window looking at the planet that stood in it's timeless space outside. As they stood by Xander walked into the room; though he appeared to be a light brown furred fox his mother was a wolf, this explained why his fur was a bit more scruffy than your average fox, his dark green eyes showed the effects of the late night he had worked as he let out a loud yawn, he was much shorter than Arlex, and wore a white t-shirt and a pair of long jean shorts. He walked over to Kursed's table and dropped a file in front of her...

"Sorry Krys..." He said struggling not to yawn again, "...if he's from Lylat he's one of the 800 vulpine on this list."

"Thanks Xander...you get some rest now okay?"

Xander yawned again on his way to the door, "Thanks for the permission."

Kursed took a sip of her coffee, "So what are you two gonna do now? Your ship..."

"I'm pretty sure we'll come up with something...we always do."

"It still doesn't make sense though..." She replied, "...you said that it was Star Wolf without a doubt that attacked your ship...Why? Last I heard the team members were labeled heros and Wolf himself left the group."

"True...I have no idea who their new leader is...but they've got something planned that I don't really like the smell of." Arlex said turning to face her, "See it's my opinion that they were after you...not us."

"What brought you to that conclusion?"

"Only two people were given our coordinates...McCloud...and you..." He said walking to her table and sitting down, "...why else would they leave me and Xander on Titania instead of coming after us? I think the point of the matter was that something happened and they missed their chance, I did manage to damage Leon's Wolfen pretty extensively before...their new pilot shot me down. I barely made it back into the ship's docking bay before they opened fire on our ship...Xander and I barely managed to make it to our escape pods before the ship blew."

"Why come after me though..."

"I...don't know..." Arlex said sarcastically, "...something having to do with you...a senator...a .50 caliper rifle...any of this ringing a bell? I know you didn't do it but...nonetheless it put a hefty price on your pretty little head."

The thought of the incident made her blood boil her claws involuntarily exposed themselves and she dug small grooves into the tabletop, "Lament..." She growled.

"Ahhhh...so he set you up...I understand why you want to kill him...but not why he'd set you up. Or did you go after him first and get caught with the evidence..."

"I..." Kursed turned away.

"That's what I thought..." Arlex said smiling a bit, "...tell me why is it you have nothing better to do with your life then to hunt him down. I know he killed Fox but, last time I heard you say anything to Fox you made it very cleat that you hated him and wished he was dead..."

Kursed was beginning to feel the tears burn the corners of her eyes...

"Killing Lament is not going to bring Fox back...and despite what you may think I can assure you that it will give you no piece of mind either. I know from experience."

That was enough as her tears fell free...

"You don't think that I know that!?" Kursed yelled vainly wiping away her tears as they were replaced by more, "This is just something I have to do! It's the only way I can apologize!"

"Krys...I know you better than anyone, you're like a little sister to me...hell I took care of you on Cerinia more than than your own parents. And if all that time with you taught me anything...it was that you are without a doubt the most stubborn vixen I've ever met."

Kursed wiped her eyes, "You're not helping..."

"Perhaps not...that was the problem though...Fox was just as stubborn as you were...up until you left." Arlex said sitting down and empty coffee cup, "After you left he cut himself off from the others emotionally...according to Falco when he saw you again during the war he started to show himself again...then he tried to get you to come back and you told him that he wasn't a part of your life anymore. After the war was over and you still hadn't come back he disband the team, boarded the Great Fox, and left Corneria...that was the last any of us saw of him..."

"I really don't want to talk about this right now Arlex I have work to do..." Kursed said picking up the files and heading out of the room...

Arlex sighed as he walked back to his spot at the window, "It's not your fault Krystal...Despite how much you convince yourself otherwise...it's just not your fault."

**(11:00am Orbit around Sauria)**

Lament woke up on the ice cold metal floor of the kitchen on his ship, he could taste a horrid mixture of Scotch and vomit. The room refused to stand still as he stood up and made his way groggily out of the kitchen, the sound of his every footstep caused his skull to split from his pounding headache. The hiss of his bedroom door sliding open as he approached sounded like nails scraping against a blackboard, a hot shower was the answer…normally Lament didn't drink to the point of inebriation but memories of his past always caused him to drink extra, it seemed that being drunk was the only way to make them go away…the problem now was that he couldn't remember what it was he was doing before he had passed out. Being that a hot shower would have possibly put him back to sleep he made sure the waters were cold enough to keep him awake…the frigid water instantly snapped him to an alert state of mind…

"Holy Shshshshit!!" Lament said shuddering as his entire body went rigid against the stream of icy water.

After he was sober again Lament changed as his clothes carried a peculiar smell that he couldn't rightly identify. He changed into a casual suit; just a white sleeveless shirt and a pair of black jeans. As soon as he was done he headed to the kitchen to get some coffee as that was usually what he used to treat a hangover. Eventually on his way to the bridge he would stop by the medical bay and take something for his headache as the migraine persisted to torment him…

Lament took a bit of time before he realized that there was a message he hadn't answered from a few days ago. Whatever the cause the message was only audio, as Lament switched on the message a raspy voice came though…

"Lament…it is an honor to finally get a message through to you. My name is Syrus Blake…don't bother looking it up, I've taken the liberty of wiping myself from the Lylat databases, but we hardly have time for that then don't we? I wish to speak with you about this object…" As the voice said this Lament's holo-imaging system came online displaying a nicely decorated sword, "…It is of Cerinian make. The sword was named Lovithar…you see I am a collector of rare and beautiful things and would pay a handsome price for this sword. Unfortunately I have been informed that another collector is in possession of this particular weapon. A man named Panther Caruso. As I have heard he has been storing the sword at his condo on the outskirts of Corneria City, go to Papetoon when you have the weapon…I'll know whether or not I should be there…I look forward to seeing you in person again…Good bye Mister Lament…."

"If that ain't the damnedest thing…" Lament said to himself studying the image of the sword, "…Computer save this image and run it through all database records…if it's worth that much it's more than just a sword. Also cross reference the word Lovithar for any matches within the closest four star systems."

Lament studied the looks of the weapon but the image was far too basic, "Match found for the word Lovithar." The ship's computer called out after a few minutes.

"And?" Lament stated curiously.

"Word is derived from two words in a human language on the planet Uth'maria in the Dan'jas system. Lovithar is a two part word made from the words "Lov" meaning key and "Ithar" meaning heaven…meaning of this term is unknown."

Lament thought of his options for a moment, "Fuck it…MEL get us to Corneria…"

"Acquiring clearance from CHSA……" MEL said going quiet for a moment, "……clearance acquired. ETA….."

"Yeahyeahyeah….about 6 hours I know….just go…"

**(Back at Katina roughly 20 minutes earlier...)**

Kursed had just returned from dropping Arlex and Xander off, she left her old friends with enough credits to help them get at least a small ship. She returned to the ship in time to receive a message for a job. She didn't really feel like doing any jobs but, she decided to play the message anyway...

The message was all audio, "Kursed...it is an honor to finally get a message through to you. My name is Syrus Blake...don't bother looking it up, I've taken the liberty of wiping myself from the Lylat databases, but we hardly have time for that then don't we? I wish to speak with you about this object…" As the voice said this Kursed's holo-imaging system came online displaying a nicely decorated sword, "…It is of Cerinian make. The sword was named Lovithar…you see I am a collector of rare and beautiful things and would pay a handsome price for this sword. Unfortunately I have been informed that another collector is in possession of this particular weapon. A man named Panther Caruso. As I have heard he has been storing the sword at his condo on the outskirts of Corneria City, go to Papetoon when you have the weapon…I'll know whether or not I should be there…I look forward to seeing you in person again…Good bye Miss Kursed…."

A connection between Cerinians and humans, that was worth looking into...and she already had something to use against Panther, the cat had a deepening crush on her from the day they'd first met so getting close to the weapon would pose no problem for her. She quickly set for clearance and headed for Corneria, oblivious to the trials that the job would lead to...

**(AN: Well that went faster than I thought it would. Funny thing is that this started as a small thing I was using as a cure for writer's block but I like it...so I think I'll keep working on it...even though I really need to work on Unchained Memories some more...THX for reading...and see ya next time...) **


	8. Running with Knives

**Chapter 8**: Running with Knives...

**April 23rd 9:49am**

**Orbit around Corneria**

Kursed woke early she didn't look forward to what she was going to do, the thought made her a bit hesitant to crawl out of bed. She rolled out of bed and put on her uniform before going through her morning routine; she washed up, brushed her fangs, fur, and hair as she did most mornings and after a short breakfast she made her way into the bridge. She was still trying to shake off the dirty feeling she had from what she was doing but, it seemed like the easiest way to get to the sword, she activated the ship's com-system...

"CAM put me through to Panther Caruso..." Kursed said shuddering at the thought of seeing him again.

Soon the holographic imager before her seat lit up and the black panther's profile appeared, his eyes grew large as he realized who it was, "Hello my dear...long time no see. You're the last person I expected to call me."

"Well I've been doing some thinking Caruso..." Kursed said trying hard to keep up a pleasant front, "...and it's about time I moved on."

"Oh if that be the case...would the lady care to join me for dinner?"

Despite the fact that she had no mutual interest in him, she'd always like his polite mannerisms...

"Sure...or we could have lunch first I can make it into a hanger by 12 o'clock..."

Panther smiled at the thought, "Hmm...an entire day with one so beautiful...noon it is then."

As soon as the image of the cat vanished Kursed stuck out her tongue and pulled her hands across it's length trying to wipe away the taste of what she'd said...

"Ugh...I can't believe I just did that..." She said looking to the ceiling, "...Fox, wherever you are I'm sorry."

She gained clearance with one of her many false identifications which registered her as one Jane Marks of Papetoon...it was one of her more favorite aliases, for the main reason that the photo made her look like an entirely different person. She called Panther and informed him to meet her at hanger N-64...

**(roughly an hour later...)**

The Raven broke out of hyperspace near one of Corneria's moons...

"Alright MEL...set the Raven into orbit around this moon, I'll take the last leg of the trip in my arwing."

Lament stopped in the docking bay; his black arwing was overdue for a system check; over the next half hour he spent his time going over the small ship's usual maintenance. He changed it's fuel cells, made sure it's weapon systems were at full power, and made sure that there were no electrical problems, as they were the most common found in the small ships. His arwing did look a bit different than the older ones aside from it's obvious paint job; the wings were thicker than usual, and it's body resembled a Mk-II arwing, but it's main advantage was it's engine the MT-X7, the first successful neutron fusion engine...the stolen prototype was called "The Razor" because of it's split second maneuvering ability. Some of it's production scientists compared it's performance to a razor cutting through a stream of water. The ship was hardly any faster than a standard Mk-II arwing, but it's advanced engine made it the most maneuverable ship there was. He had painted it the very day he'd stolen it. Well at least he took the credit for stealing it, in truth he...borrowed it from it's original thief...

When all systems checked out Lament boarded the arwing and fired up the engine...he closed his eyes and leaned his head back taking in the light roar it gave off, he'd always loved that sound...He then pulled the cockpit hatch shut over him and went over the vehicle's systems, preparing for launch. Lament shot out of the Raven's docking bay at his usual high rate of speed. He was flying fine until something hit his shields forcing his arwing to shake violently. It was laser fire, he took a glance to the side the hit had come from and as he saw a familiar looking ship speeding toward him. Lament smiled to himself as he opened a com link with the approaching ship...

"Hello O'donell...I was wondering when I'd run into you." He said as the gray lupine's one eyed face appeared on his arwing's small plasma screen.

"Get ready to die Lament."

Lament laughed, "I couldn't be more prepared if I had noose around my neck."

"One way or another you'll face up to your crimes..."

Several more shots flew by which Lament flawlessly avoided...

"My crimes?..." Lament laughed, "...look who's going all self-righteous. Maybe you should look into things before you start handing out sentences your honor. Does it really constitute murder when the departed wants to die?"

As Lament finished the transmission was terminated, and Wolf fired at him a few more times. Two of the four fired shot were deflected by his ship's shields. Lament pulled his ship into a tight barrel roll while kicking on his engine's boosters, he wasn't too surprised to see Wolf's wolfen mimicking his movements perfectly. A wide smile spread across his face... "HaHa...This is gonna be fun."

He pulled every evasive maneuver he knew, but Wolf being the expert pilot that he was but, soon the constant stream of laser fire from bounding off of his deflector shields began to drain the power from his defense systems, several more hits from the wolfen's extra powerful weapons and he'd be a sitting duck. Lament chuckled a bit, "Time to stop playing Wolfy." He said to himself. He locked his targeting systems onto a piece of space debris several hundred yards ahead of him. He quickly fired a single nova bomb at the object and fired his thrusters. Wolf did the same just as Lament had hoped and as Lament passed up the bomb and the debris Wolf found himself half blinded by the blast that went off several meters ahead of him, he was forced to break away from his pursuit. The blast also damaged his shields quite a bit, but as he searched the area when the blast cleared...Lament was gone...

"He didn't have time to break atmosphere..." Wolf said to himself, "...did the blast take him out?"

Wolf was cut from his thoughts as several laser shots rattled his wolfen, he kicked his thrusters on...now it was his turn to run. Wolf, like Lament, made every attempt possible to get away from the arwing that followed behind him as though he were towing it himself...but as Wolf noticed a passing meteor he got his own bright idea. Wolf fired a nova bomb into the heart of the meteor as it was some distance away. The massive but, eerily silent blast caused the massive space boulder to fragment into hundreds of smaller pieces creating a small asteroid field which he led Lament into. Wolf vanished into the created diversion out of Lament's sight. Lament smiled as he brought his arwing to a full stop, he took aim at some of the largest meteor he could find and fired the only remaining nova bomb he was carrying. Wolf wasn't expecting that as the meteors began to fragment closing in around him, he barely managed to get out. He eventually found his way back to Lament and found himself on Lament's tail again...but Lament was wasting his time no matter how much fun he was having.

Wolf's jaw dropped as he watched Lament's arwing; the wings split into three separate wings on each side, one above and below the main wing, these extra wings then turned and locked into place making their sides parallel with the cockpit. He jaw nearly hit his lap when the arwing he'd been chasing turned 180 degrees on a central pivot and shot back in his direction...this was something that no ship he'd ever known of were capable of. To make a perfect u-turn in place without losing momentum was unheard of. As Lament rushed by several laser bolts made it through Wolf's shields tearing expertly into his wings which caused an alert siren to blare off inside his cockpit...

Lament's face appeared on his com system's screen, "I'll leave you with a bit of dignity this time O'donell...but fuck with me again and you'll wish you were never born..."

The transmission cut off as Lament's arwing shifted it's wings back to normal and burst through the planet's atmosphere...now Wolf was clear on how Lament was able to shoot down Fox...he fought just like him, like a mad man...

**(Corneria City hanger N-64)**

Kursed landed in the hanger at about 11 o'clock, to her not so great surprise Panther was there waiting. If it hadn't been for his ego problem he may have seemed charming for more than a few moments. At the moment he was smiling in her direction. Kursed figured that most girls would have found him charming, dashing even but she was hardly like most girls; he was dressed in a more than appropriate flair, a blue silk button up shirt and dark blue jeans., he was quick to take her hand kissing it in a gentlemanly fashion, but from her time dating him before Kursed knew him all too well...

"I was hoping to have a second chance after...the unpleasantness of our last meeting."

"Well everyone deserves a second chance..." She replied, "...so you have a place in mind?"

"Don't I always?"

Panther lead Kursed to a waiting hover car, and after a short while they were at a rather fancy looking place. It was the kind of restaurant that she would have normally walked by and ignored, but at this point she was willingly walking inside...with someone she didn't even like...to be fully honest she had more feelings for dying vegetation, but he was her ticket to getting to the weapon without much of a fight or any trouble...she was lucky enough that the last place anyone would be looking for her at the moment would be Corneria. Kursed didn't even bother taking in the sights of the highly decorated restaurant she simply followed Panther to their table. There wasn't much for conversation as they ate...Kursed could at least admit that Panther was trying he explained everything that he and the Star Wolf team had been through after the war, and Kursed did the same...

**(Elsewhere in the city...)**

Lament could see Panther through the window of the restaurant from his position high atop a 15 story building across the street, he'd received a tip off from a pedestrian who claimed he was at a local restaurant with a date. He seemed to be talking to someone across from him but, thanks to his position Lament could not see the cat's date. To avoid any noisy confrontation Lament was perfectly dressed for stealth; he wore his black long coat and carried only his sword and the chain he took from Kursed when they were on Mo'jan's ship. Soon enough he noticed that the Panther was getting ready to leave, luckily he had already bugged his target's car. So to keep suspicions low he headed back down the building. By the time he made it out the front door Lament noticed that Panther's car was already gone, the scanner on his wrist communicator gave him a location they were stopping at some other place, judging by the placement on the map it was the hanger...possibly to drop his date off.

Lament followed his target for some time until he was led to a rather expensive looking condo just on the outside of the city. He spent about an hour examining the perimeter, of the complex before heading back into town. He normally would have looked for a bar at this point but, being he had a job to do he found a place a bit more practical. A quaint little coffee shop on the outskirts of town with an outdoor sitting area on a lovely patio; the chairs were all nicely crafted of metal. He found a nice seat and turned it away from the shop facing the direction of Panther's condo. He set his sword on the table next to him and was soon greeted by a smooth, soft voice...

"Can I get you something sir?"

Lament looked to the voice's source standing by his table, now standing there was a breathtakingly beautiful Manx with snow white fur, he body was to die for, and her eyes were a striking shade of light green, he shoulder length hair was delightfully curled and wavy...

Lament looked her over before smiling, "Wow...as long as you come back with it you can bring me anything."

Her incredibly light fur was obviously her downfall as it showed her blush clearly, "Umm...hah...thank you...but I'm engaged."

"Lucky fella...but if that's the case the strongest drink you have. And something to eat..."

"Let's see food..." She thought to herself, "...well all we have in terms of food are some pretty lousy cakes, the coffee's not half bad though."

"Hey as long as it doesn't taste like stale cardboard I'll eat it..." Lament said.

"Well then you definitely don't want the cakes." She replied laughing pretty loudly.

Lament could help but join, she had a very infectious laugh, "Thanks for the warning the coffee will be fine. Thank you...um..."

"Lanna..." She replied.

"Lovely Lanna...name's Maryk Creed." Lament said extending his hand.

She took his hand only to be pulled close enough for him to kiss it...She walked inside and came back out with a cup of hot coffee. Lament paid more than double the price, he'd really enjoyed talking to the waitress, he especially enjoyed watching her walk away. He propped his feet up on a railing not far from his seat that separated the patio from the side walk and lightly tilted his seat back. Now all he had left to do was wait and drink his coffee. He actually found it was pretty good compared to the ungodly swill that he normally settled for on his ship, but it was far too sweet for his taste...good coffee of bad he still preferred Scotch. The hours passed far too slowly for his liking, soon enough the lovely waitress Lanna waved to him as she and a rather luck wolf rode by. Finally the sun started to disappear over the Cornerian horizon, and then as he was hoping Panther's car rushed away from his home. Lament made his way to the house, he didn't know how long this window was but he was going to take it. He didn't have any trouble getting to the large two story mansion.

Living life the way he did Lament was well practiced in the art of breaking and entering, so much that he usually didn't even do any breaking. He got inside without a problem; he found the place to be elaborately decorated with plush carpeting, and an unusual amount of pictures of Panther himself on the walls...

"Wow this guy isn't conceited is he?"

Within an hour he'd searched the entire house but he couldn't find the sword...and what's worse he ran out of time as he heard Panther's car pull into the drive...

"Shit!!" Lament silently screamed to himself as the front door began to slide open, causing him to dive into a nearby closet.

Lament could barely make anything out from the pea sized crack he left in the door of the closet but he could see well enough to see the blue vixen that walked in before Panther. This was an interesting twist he hadn't expected Kursed to be here...he especially didn't expect to see her dressed so casually, a pari of white jeans and a form fitting white tank top...

"Perhaps I could show you my collection upstairs later." Panther said taking a coat that hung from her shoulders.

"Really...upstairs you say?" Lament whispered to himself.

"Perhaps in a bit...you said something about having something for me?" Kursed said.

Panther recalled for a moment, "Right...oddly enough I believe it was yours to begin with...I found it when we inspected the old McCloud manor out on Notting Hill."

After the two became merely voices in the background Lament made his way upstairs as quietly as possible. At that moment however Panther and Kursed were in the living room where Panther handed her a small necklace with a red stone at the end of it. She forced back her tears as she held the stone in her hand...

"If you wouldn't mind...what exactly is the significance to that stone? Is it part of your heritage?"

Kursed slid the necklace around her neck, "Yes Panther...it is part of a Cerinian tradition. You see it's the females of my tribe that hold most of the power, even the power to chose our mates at an early age. Cerinian women are trained brutally as fighting machines and magical warriors if the particular vixen has the gifts for magic. All Cerinian women of a certain age are given two necklaces of varying colors; one symbolizing our heart which is most often a red stone, and one being our spirit, this stone varies from person to person..."

"So the red stone is a way of giving you heart to the one you love?"

"Precisely..." Kursed said, "...but my people were all destroyed...so you could understand why I would want the sword."

Panther nodded, "Of course, of course...it's only natural that you would want something that by all rights should be yours..." He said as they began to make their way upstairs, "...but you realize that that weapon took a large sum of money to acquire...I'm afraid I cannot just hand it over."

Lament was searching the only bedroom he could find upstairs, but there was nothing; no hidden areas for it to be hidden, no switches, nothing. He started to leave the room but he heard a set of approaching footsteps and quickly rolled under the bed who's covers luckily hung low enough to hide him while allowing him to see whoever else might be in the room. He watched as Kursed entered the room followed by Panther who hid the fact that he'd locked the door...

_Please tell me this idiot isn't that stupid..._

"Well..." Kursed said turning toward Panther, "Where is it?"

"I'd really like to talk about how you're going to pay for it..." Panther said.

"Then why not come out and say it...remember I am a telepath I know what you've been thinking for the last few hours."

"Well then...there wouldn't be much of a price involved...I'm not asking for your companionship..." Panther smiled, "...just one night."

Kursed actually moved her body against his, "I guess I don't have much of a choice then do I?"

Lament couldn't believe his eyes when Kursed engaged Panther in a rather heated kiss, then slowly began to work her way down his body kissing his defined chest as she undid the buttons on his shirt. Finally stopping and freeing the zipper on his pants allowing his already half erect member to worm it's own way out. Lament noticed an increasingly odd look on Kursed's face as she slowly began to cradle the appendage in a caring manner first just with her hands then her tongue. Lament saw it coming as Panther lay his head back to let out a soft moan. Kursed's face curled into an insidiously evil snarl. Panther's scream could have been heard from miles around as Kursed sunk her fangs into his manhood locking her jaws into a rather tight grip. Just watching this take place made Lament look away cradling his own crotch from some sort of sympathy pains. As Lament looked back onto the spectacle Panther had a good grip around each of Kursed's ears struggling vainly to get her off but he only managed to make things worse as his attempts began to tear the wounds even more. Kursed twitched her jaws biting down a bit harder forcing Panther to break into full blown sobs pleading mercifully for her to let go...

"First tell me where the sword is..." Kursed managed to say between her teeth, which was surprising considering the amount of blood that was overflowing her mouth at the moment, not to mention several other liquids that were leaking from the wounds her razor like fangs had created.

After a moment Lament noticed a familiar look in her eyes, she was reading his mind, the extreme pain that he was in was dropping his defenses to the point of being paper thin...but when she stopped the enraged look on her face soured even more...

_You sick mother fucker!!!_ Her voice slammed into Lament's skull like a slug a point blank range.

Panther released a scream that could have risen the dead...on the other side of the planet. With all the force she could possibly muster Kursed bit down on the bleeding hunk of meat separating it from Panther's body. As Kursed stood up Panther fell to the floor his body convulsing horribly from the shock he'd just gone into. Kursed wiped some of the blood from her face and spit the severed member onto Panther's chest...

"It was too damned small anyway..." She huffed turning to a nearby bookshelf.

Lament watched as she pulled a single book away and pressed a small switch...it was such a simple thing that he'd overlooked that would have given him the prize. Kursed walked into the new room giving Lament a moment to head out of the room stopping to cringe at the sight of the state Panther had been left in. As he watched Kursed from a crack in the door; she exited the small room and walked to an window where she looked outside while hugging the weapon close to her body. As Lament looked on she pulled the sword away from her body and studied it closely, it was an opening. With a lithe movement across the room Lament made a quick stride toward her and dove directly at her, Kursed heard this movement and strafed to her left...unfortunately this was what Lament had wanted. As he passed by her he reached out and took the sword by it's handle...Kursed couldn't stop the momentum created by his moving body as the weapon was torn from her hands and Lament was hurled through the window. Followed by a loud crash...

Kursed rushed to the window, upon his decent Lament had hit several trash cans indefinitely separating his shoulder...he turned to look to the window but broke into a shocking run as he noticed Kursed had leaped from the window. Kursed, being the athlete she was, landed at a running start and as they entered the city limits she was beginning to gain on the injured thief. Lament glanced over his shoulder only to notice that she was only a few yards behind him...as he kept up his pace he slit the sword into his belt and reached out taking a nearby metal trash can's lid, this confused Kursed up until a hover car pulled in front of them. Lament quickly tossed the lid out in front of him and whipped his Manariki chain into the vehicle's bumper while leaping onto the lid. It hurt a bit when the car tugged on the chain but, his plan worked as it began to tow him at a much faster speed then he could have ran at, or better yet at a greater speed then Kursed could run at. As she vanished from sight and the spaceport grew ever closer, an unfamiliar hover cycle blasted toward him carrying an all too familiar body. Kursed pulled up beside him just in time for him to give his chain a skilled flick which released it's grip from the vehicle forcing him and his lid...or what was left of it...to skid to a halt unfortunately hover cycles don't stop so fast and Kursed sped on for a hundred yards or so. Lament rushed into the space port shouting into his communicator...

"MEL get us a course the fuck out of here! Home, hell, somewhere! Anywhere but here!"

Lament leaped into his arwing and pulled the hatch shut then forced his limp left hand into one of the overhead handles, and while holding his arm in place pulled until he muffled a scream that would have followed the loud crunch of his shoulder snapping back into place. He quickly cleared his launch and tore into Corneria's atmosphere with an insanely pissed off vixen hot on his trail...


	9. Greif

**Chapter 9**: Grief...

**The Raven **

**10:41pm**

It was at the current time Lament wished his fag ship wasn't so god damn big, though fast for a dreadnought class ship...it was nothing compared to the small ship that his peruser piloted. Her attempts to stop the massive craft were in vain as it's shields were far stronger than her ship's weak lasers. Lament pleaded over and over to MEL to get clearance for a hyperspace jump, he wasn't sure why but he'd pissed Kursed off to a broad no level by taking the sword. Kursed however knew the sword's true purpose, what it was and what it did, she'd simply been brought up to believe that it didn't exist, that it was some sort of fairy tale, but now she knew better...it was real and he had it...

Lament was relief stricken when he heard the announcement...

"Warp jump clearance acquired...destination Home..."

"Good good good...Sauria is very good just go. And prepare to land she'll be looking for this ship. I don't know why but she's got a serious hard on for that sword."

Kursed was forced to pull her ship back as she realized that Lament's warp engines were lighting up, the shock wave created by a warp jump wasn't incredibly powerful but, you didn't want to be too close when a ship of any kind jumped into hyperspace. The aftermath within any range of less than 40 meters had the same effect as a very weak EMP, not enough that an EMP was cause to worry as all ships were equipped with fail safe mechanisms that would simply shut down most of the ship's systems, the problem then was getting everything back online.

"CAM track their path! Do NOT let that son of a bitch get away!" Kursed yelled as she turned her ship to get to a safe distance.

She was overcome with distress as the huge ship disappeared in a heartbeat...

"CAM please...for the love of god tell me you were able to get a fix on their path..." Kursed pleaded.

"Affirmative...warp jump signal only strong enough to reach a distance of 1,200,000lightyears."

"Are there any planets at that exact distance from here?"

CAM went silent for a moment, "Affirmative...planets Aquos and Sauria are at the moment at equal distance from our current position."

"I know where he's going...plot a course for Sauria."

**(Meanwhile in hyperspace...)**

Lament let out a sigh of relief, the last thing he would have wanted was for her to finally get up the gall to board his ship...then he'd have a pissed off vixen and a fucked up arm to deal with, he began to question his path in jumping out the window but his questions still remained...what was so god damn important about one fucking sword? Contempt with the fact that at least at the moment he was safe, Lament went to the science lab that was on one of the lower decks, where he could study the weapon much more clearly. He realized at some point that it was wrapped in a sheet of some kind, something Kursed had most likely done to keep suspicions down. Although with the amount of blood covering her blue fur and white clothes, Lament was amazed she didn't attract more attention than she did...but then again they were both running pretty fast.

He was amazed at how dusty the room was...but then again he hadn't had a scientist on board in over five years so, it was relatively unused. Lament walked over to a table and brushed away some of the glass tubes and equipment, laying the object in their place. He pulled away the sheet slowly; Lament had never seen such a blade, it was a bit longer than the one he carried, but it's blade was double sided and luminescent, damn near see thru, it's hilt looked normal enough until it was examined upside down. The handle was shaped like a reaper who's scythe was held at an angle so that the blade curved underneath him forming the hilt, the scythe's long shaft forming a sort of crude knuckle guard, all about it was writing in tiny runic symbols. He ran a small scanner over the weapon's handle several times, and then he plugged the device into a small nearby computer which began to analyze the script on the weapon...

"Computer...see what you can do about translating that..." Lament called to the ship's computer.

He then took his attention to the blade, there had to be some sort of explanation to why it was clear and luminescent, he knew of no metal that could do such a thing. He placed the blade under a small square machine that uses a type of gravity field to test something's density...the test took a few minutes but the readings came out wrong...

"15.38 grams per square centimeter?...that can't be right..." Lament said looking over the readout again and doing the test again...

The results were the same...whatever it was made of had a surface density nearly five times that of diamond. Nothing on record was so dense but, here was the proof sitting right in front of him; there was only one other test that needed to be done...reading the thing's energy level. Lament took out another scanner and turned it on then began to walk back toward the weapon. The device in his hand let out an odd sound before catching fire, Lament, scared shitless, threw the scanner to the ground and stomped out the flames...

"Holy shit!!!" He shouted in surprise, "What in the fuck is this thing? It's a good think I'm headed to Sauria...Belladonna should know something about this thing."

After concluding his tests on the weapon Lament headed toward his room, he placed the sword on small sword rack that normally held his own sword and headed for bed, stripping down to his boxers before climbing under the sheets. He'd had a long day, and was in a bit of pain still from his swan-dive into the trash cans at Panther's place, but overall the more powerful urge to sleep overruled the pain and he faded into a deep sleep...

**(En route to Katina via hyperspace...)**

Kursed had found it nearly impossible to get a direct hyperspace route to Sauria but, in the end got an idea and instead decided to head to Katina then get another clearance pass to Sauria from there. At the moment however she was in need of a shower, the blood that covered her face and most of the front of her body. As the hot waters washed away the remnants of her actions she thought back to the moment she'd read Panther's mind, finding only the thoughts of raping her as well as the memories of doing so to a number of other young girls...she was proud of the fact of what she'd done to him, he had deserved every second of the pain, and didn't deserve what she'd removed...She'd heard of men living through the amputation of the body part before, but judging by the amount of blood that covered her she was pretty certain he was dead, if the shock hadn't killed him the blood loss did. She couldn't help but wonder how many had fallen to his tricks before, the cat's charming demeanor was the perfect cover for what he truly was...

Soon there was no trace of him left on her deceivingly delicate body, she still had a hard time with the thought though...

"I still can't believe I put that...thing in my mouth." She shuddered.

After her shower and a few fits of brushing her fangs...she tried to go to sleep, but her body and mind wouldn't allow it. There was just too much to think of, and on top of that she was still hungry as she didn't get much to eat with her...date, her main thought however was of the sword. That one object could solve all of her troubles in one fell swoop...but just as she'd gotten her hands on it that bastard snatched it right out of her paws. She hated the fact that she couldn't read his mind, but since she had been saved she discovered a lot of people with a will strong enough to keep her out, Fox was the first person she'd met able to block it out...it was one of the things that most attracted her to him, she had no way of predicting him. The more time she spent with Fox the more people like him she met, but of all of them Lament was the worst. His willpower was unlike anything she'd ever encountered before, it gave her a headache anytime she even tried to touch his mind.

She cured her hunger before going to the bridge, she was still awake when she reached Katina, but after setting up a course for Sauria she nodded off in her captain's seat. Her dreams were...surprisingly pleasant as she saw herself with the sword and Fox, with her entire life finally having meaning again. It was the kind of dream that she sorely missed...

**(Planet Sauria...5:09am)**

Lament was woken up by the rocking of his massive ship as it...for the first time in years...landed on solid ground. The Raven landed in the only safe place for such a large ship to land in a manner that would not leave it in the open or damage it in any way, well at least not seriously. Moon mountain pass seemed like the perfect place for such a landing...sure a few rock formations would be ruined but for the most part the place was out of the way of most travelers. Unfortunately Belladonna's place was some distance from where he was; he made sure he had all of his weapons on him, including Lovithar, and headed out. It was a pretty good walk from where he was to Cape Claw...but he had no choice but to walk it...

As he made his way into Thorntail Hollow he saw something that made his heart drop. A familiar blue ship landed on the far side of the hollow...which was unfortunate as that was where he needed to go. As he watched Kursed depart from the ship with her spear in hand, as well as a noticeable blaster holster strapped to her right thigh, Lament quickly hid behind a large rock formation. Unfortunately for him several shots from a blaster struck the boulder he hid behind...

"GET YOUR ASS OUT HERE LAMENT!!! I JUST WANT THE SWORD!!!"

Lament laughed out loud, "YEA!!! SOMETHING EXTRA FOR YOU TO TRY SHOVING UP MY ASS RIGHT NEXT TO THAT SPEAR!!!"

"YOU HAVE NO IDEA WHAT THAT THING IS CAPABLE OF...THERE'S A REASON THE CERINIANS GOT RID OF IT!!!"

"AND YOU'RE TELLING ME THIS WHY?!! AS LONG AS I CAN REMEMBER YOU'VE BEEN TRYING TO SKIN MY ASS ALIVE!!!" Lament yelled across the field.

Lament stepped out from behind the rock with his own blaster aimed at her, "LISTEN YOU IGNORANT FUCK!!! WHOEVER THIS SYRUS BLAKE IS...YOU CAN BET YOUR LIFE HE HAS A REASON FOR WANTING IT!!!"

"WAIT A SECOND!!! YOU GOT THAT MESSAGE TOO?!!!"

"WHY DO YOU THINK I'M NOT TRYING TO KILL YOU RIGHT NOW?!!"

"YOU'LL FORGIVE ME IF I DON'T BELIEVE YOU!!!"

Kursed put her blaster away, "I CAN RESPECT THAT!!! BUT AS OF NOW THIS IS A BIT BIGGER THEN YOU AND I...WHY DID YOU BRING IT TO SAURIA?!!!" Kursed asked walking carefully toward him.

"A friend of mine lives here...nobody knows Cerinian culture better than she dose..." Lament answered with his blaster still fixed on her.

"You? Friends?"

"You know that would have hurt a lot less if you didn't sound so shocked." Lament said, "She happens to be the top researcher of anything having to do with the Cerinians."

Kursed seemed a bit offended, "Excuse me...I happen to be a Cerinian..."

"Yeah well...so is she..."

Kursed frowned a bit, "You gonna get that thing out of my face now?"

"I don't know...after seeing what you did to Caruso back there I'm hesitant enough just standing this close to you."

"Look I hate saying this but...even you have morals...trust me he had it coming."

"Trust is an elusive thing you know..." Lament said following her with his blaster, "...it tends to run off as soon as someone tries to kill you. We had a deal remember?"

"Yeah we did...and I fulfilled my part of it..." Kursed smiled, "...we got the girls out. You simply failed to clarify where we were taking them, docking bay seemed far enough for me."

"Alright I'll buy that..." Lament said, "...but if all of what you've said is true...then this Syrus guy wanted us both to go after this thing for a reason." He finished holding up the sword.

"Agreed...lets go see your friend...where is she?"Kursed agreed walking away from him.

He wasn't sure whether or not she meant business until she turned her back on him, to a thief this was the ultimate sign of trust as in the older days they were referred to as backstabbers, "She's got a small shack in Cape Claw near the old force point temple."

**(000)**

Lament was needless to say cautious of the vixen, he made sure to keep her in sight at all times...not that she blamed him she actually found it a bit flattering that he was so threatened by her. It was hours of walking before they came to the small forested area in the Lightfoot territory. Where they stopped for a moment, Kursed and Lament seemed to notice it all at once. There were no sounds; no birds, or any other creatures...just the eerie, salty breeze that flowed into the area from the cape ahead. Kursed turned to say something only to find that Lament was gone, she began to cautiously back up toward a nearby tree...

"Lament..." She half yelled half whispered, "...where the fuck are you?"

A slight scream rushed past her lips as something latched onto her tail effortlessly pulling her into the tree. As soon as she was sitting on one of the tree limbs Lament's paw clamped her muzzle shut. He drew his face close to hers...

"Shhhh..." He hissed to her.

"What the hell's going on here?" She asked.

Lament pointed to the place they'd walked in from, where there were now a small number of Sharpclaw soldiers, "The Sharpclaw took this territory over about a year ago..." He pointed out as the stubby little armored dinosaurs headed into the nearby village.

"What happened to the Lightfoot?"

"What was left of them Migrated north..."

Kursed gave him an odd look, "How do you know?"

"Remember when I disappeared about a year back?" Lament asked, "Well this is where I was. They helped me out a while back so I kind of owed em one. I held off whatever Sharpclaw I could while the tribe made their way to the new village."

Kursed didn't say anything in reply, she had an image of him that had been set when she heard he had killed Fox. She figured he was completely emotionless, but here she found that he'd assisted an entire tribe from being wiped out...

"Coast is clear...lets go..." He said jumping from the tree.

"Enlighten me why are we hiding from these freaks? We've both killed them before, that party was no more than ten..."

Lament shook his head, "Yeah true...not to mention the several hundred or thousand on the other side of that wall." He said pointing toward the old Lightfoot village.

**(000)**

The rest of their trip was uneventful, Lament had begun to feel a bit less cautious as Kursed was obviously not planning on doing anything stupid at the time. He even began telling her about the many things he'd done while on Sauria. Soon enough they came across a small wooden shack near the massive temple set up on the beach. The stone entrance to he temple was carved in the shape of a massive Krazoa head; the shack was small and obviously hand built, it seemed to be abandoned. A small rope hung from a hole just near the door, which Kursed grabbed and pulled. She was caught by surprise as Lament pulled her out of the way just as a bamboo spear lodged itself into the wall where she'd been standing...

Lament examined the spear, "Huh that's funny...It used to be an arrow." He said, "YO! BELLA...OLD HAG...YOU HERE!? IT'S ME LAMENT!!!" He shouted.

"Where else do you think I'd be you ugly little son of a bitch..."

"YEAH I'M PRETTY SURE SHE WAS!!! JUST LET ME IN!!!"

The door swung open on it's own, there was a powerful smell of incense and different herbs as the two walked inside the dark hut, which was much bigger than it seemed. Kursed looked around noticing that there was a Cerinian staff hanging from a wall; a large stack of cards decorated a round table in the center of the room. As she looked around a figure walked up to them from the shadows, whoever it was was wearing an old gray cloak and hood. The figured hugged Lament before retreating to a seat at the table...

"Lets see it then..." She said in an aged voice.

Lament took out the sword and set it before Belladonna, "Do you know anything about it Miss Donna."

The hooded figure moved her head slightly toward Kursed, "You must be...Kursed yes?"

"Yes..."

"Well it's nice to know that the Cerinian line doesn't end with my old tail...and Bella will do dear."

Bella ran her hands back and forth above the sword a bit, before very briskly ordering Lament to make some tea...

"You know for a bitch as old as you are you sure do like giving orders..."

Bella laughed, "Only orders for a bitch like you to follow now snap too it..." She said, "...now then what do you two know about this weapon?"

Lament decided to go first as he started working with the tea, "Well...it's called Lovithar, humans had something to do with it's creation, it's blade is more dense than diamond, and it's storing up a shit load of energy..."

"And you my dear?" Bella asked turning to Kursed.

"Arlex and my mother often told me stories about the sword when I was young..." She started, "...they said that when Cerinia was still young. Humans tried to help our people with our development as a people...but after a time some humans thought we should be slaves and started forcing us into slavery. That led to Cerinia's first and only war...it lasted 60 years, but in the end a new treaty was formed and the Cerinians and humans made two swords together to finalize the treaty Lovithar and Danithar. The two swords were given to the tribes one to a human and the other to a Cerinian...it was said that both swords were made with powerful magic but nobody knew what exactly they could do..."

"You are well studied..." Bella said, "...but the truth behind the swords was the fact that they were one part of a two part spell each. They were meant to right terrible wrongs by allowing a body to physically enter the spiritual or ether realm, you Lament are curious as to what they are made of...this luminescent material is called Etherialite...only magic can create it as it is the same material that our souls are composed of. Each blade took the combined strength of 20 spell weavers to create...as well 10 souls were willingly sacrificed to power the swords. Soon the humans of Cerinia left the planet...at that time both our tribes were very advanced in our technology. It was decided that it would be best for the tribes to separate, and shortly after the human tribe left we Cerinians cast aside our technology. The swords were kept by their keepers, and secretly the tribes hid their true purpose..."

"And what was their purpose? Little use could come from just walking into the Ether realm." Lament said passing out cups of tea.

"The reason they can allow one to enter the Ether is so that one spirit can be given a second chance..."

Kursed's face lit up, "It can bring back the dead?"

"In theory yes...but, it was unknown whether or not it would work...they were never used."

"What is the second part to the spell?" Kursed asked.

"A large stone dais on a round alter bearing the same inscription as that on the weapon..._Allow thy passage to the realm of spirits...right the wrongs that were not meant to be..."_

"Listen you two..." Bella said, "...you can stay here for the night but...no fighting of any kind, not even a harsh word. Understood?"

"Perfectly...I'll leave the sword in your care for now." Lament said walking out the door.

"What's wrong with him?"

Bella turned her head toward the sword picking it up, "If my guess is right...and it usually is he's visiting her grave."

"Grave?"

Kursed walked outside only to see that Lament was nowhere in sight, Belladonna walked by and pointed toward the well leading to the Lightfoot village, she quickly made her way to the well and as she entered the hole in the ground she could hear something until she walked to the edge of the wooden planking on the sides of the well...

"Hey..." Lament's words echoed all the way up to Kursed, "...sorry I haven't visited in a while Kursed has been riding her chases right up my ass. It's getting harder to keep going; the more I see her, the more she reminds me of you...and the more I just want to let her end it...but the last thing you'd want is for me to give up...but I swear that if I ever find the one that did this to you...he'll suffer. What Kursed did to Panther...I swear it'll look like a routine surgery by time I'm done..."

After that his words faded into choked sobs...Kursed couldn't listen anymore and headed back toward the hut until several minutes later when Lament approached her.

"Hey do me a favor..." He said trying to avoid eye contact, "...if Bella asks I needed some things from my ship in Moon Mountain Pass."

"Sure."

After Lament was gone for some time she made her way back to the well and found her way to the bottom; the bottom of the well mounded up near the middle, where a single gravestone sat surrounded in fresh roses that Lament had planted on the grounds, the perimeter of the small area was surrounded by water. The gravestone was carved with words though some were faded...

_'Your spirit will live on in the hearts of those you leave behind...' _

The name was completely illegible for some reason, but for the most part for some reason she had a hard time looking at the grave. Lament and her...they were the same, driven by the same goal, but why didn't Lament hunt down her killer?

"Why would he just sit here and cry over a gravestone?"

"Because she wouldn't have wanted me to kill for revenge?" Lament's voice echoing from above startled her, "Now if you're done invading my private space...I brought some food back with me."

Kursed made her way back up to where he was, "How did you get back so fast?"

"Arwing...you know flying machine, fast..."

Kursed sighed, "Yeah I got your point smart ass."

The two walked together toward the hut but, Kursed couldn't help herself...

"What happened?" She asked.

Lament stopped and looked out to the ocean's horizon, "I don't know...it actually happened about four years ago...we'd split up...for some reason, can't remember why...Hah...Shows you how important the fight was. I spent a long time looking for her but, one day I heard that her ship was reported as being shot down. There wasn't even anything left to bury...but that was before all of this...she would have wanted me to move on...what about you?"

"Pretty much the same story actually...accept the fact is that I know who killed the one I loved..." Kursed said walking away, "...I've been after him for the last four years."

Lament quickly caught up with her, "For what it's worth I'm sorry. My line of work you end up killing a lot of people..."

"I'm sorry too...I'm sure that you were a decent person before she died."

"Gee thanks..." Lament said with a chuckle.

"You know Lament...in a sick kind of way I've always respected you..."

"Not much to respect..." Lament replied, "...but the feeling's mutual. You're fighting for something you believe in."

Soon they were back at the hut, "Don't think this changes anything...you're still my enemy when this is all over."

"You're still my enemy now...but everybody needs a break now and again."

Kursed laughed to herself, "Nice philosophy..."

**(000)**

Lament handled the cooking for the night, the two ladies didn't seem to object. Kursed had finally gotten to see Belladonna without her hood on, the filaments were missing from her eyes making them pure white with blindness, her fur showed slight signs of old age, the light blue of her fur was lined with slight amounts of gray. After eating Belladonna admitted that she needed to get to bed. Kursed followed her into the hut and soon walked out to find Lament sitting on the wing of his arwing examining Lovithar closely...

"Something wrong?"

"I was just thinking that these swords could fix so many problems...it's too bad you're people only made two of them."

"You could find the dais and bring her back you know?"

Lament shook his head, "No...the dead are dead...this sort of magic could only lead to more problems. She wouldn't want me to cling to the past like that..." He said with a sigh, "...No, I'll just live on fighting until the day you finally take me out with your own skill."

"Good..." Kursed replied, "...it wouldn't feel right if you just gave up and died. It would feel too much like assisted suicide than actually killing you."

"What about you then..." He said handing the sword down to her, "...You could save that lost love of yours."

Kursed ran her fingers along the blade, "I could...but no...you're right...death is a part of nature. This weapon, or tool is a perversion of everything my mother and Arlex ever taught me..." She tried to hid her tears from her enemy, "...but I'd give anything just to see him again, or hear his voice...feel his warmth."

"You know there's no measure to how sorry I am..." Lament said, "...I made you what you are, when you were probably a very nice person at one time. I ruined your future...I guess her death was just karma catching up with me."

"Well good night...and be ready to run in the morning." Kursed said.

"Good night." Lament replied...

**(The next morning...)**

Kursed woke up on a small cot, she'd been tucked in with several thick blankets. As she remembered that she was there with Lament she rushed out the door of the hut, his arwing was gone, as well were his things and the sword. She smiled, for the main reason that she'd seen it coming. Kursed thanked Belladonna and made her way back to her ship far off at the Hollow.

"CAM lets get out of here. I know where he's headed. Set a course for Papetoon."


	10. A Deadly Game pt 1

**Chapter 10**: A Deadly Game pt 1

**(Orbit around Papetoon)**

**6:44am GST**

Lament looked to the green sphere slowly spinning below his ship which was locked in the planet's orbit floating aimlessly on it gravitational pull. He had several cups of coffee, and a small glass of Scotch to wake him up which together did the job rather well. Lament had sent word to Syrus several hours ago but, who did he expect to be awake a 4 in the morning. He waited around for some time but no signal came. Finally after hours of waiting Lament received the call he'd hoped for...

"Ah Lament...so good to know you aren't dead...too bad I cannot speak so openly about that Caruso fellow..." As the first time they talked the message was all audio.

"Cut the crap. I'm on to your little game..."

"Oh really...then enlighten me..."

Lament stood up from his seat, "You sent me and Kursed both after the sword hoping one or both of us would die, that part I still haven't figured out, but you killed off Tyrel because he found out about your little plan...he tried to warn me but I was too late, then you sent Star Wolf after Arlex and Xander because you knew Xander was eventually going to find something on Titania's surface that you didn't want him to find. So my question now is...what do you want with this sword, before I shoot it into Sol?"

"It's not what I intend to do with the weapon but rather what my employer wants with it..."

"Works for me...now you gonna hide or show your face...Slash?"

As Lament said this his com systems imaging device came on showing the grinning face of a black and brown furred canine; his muzzle was a bit longer and more pointed than Lament or Kursed's, his eye brows were light brown like the fur that started at his throat and lead down into the neck of his shirt, his ears stood strait up despite the fact that one was missing, his right eye was a light brown where his left matched Lament's missing eye, which was fitting since they'd given each other their particular disability a short while back...

"I thought I left your sorry ass in prison." Lament growled.

"You did...but there hasn't been a cage yet that can hold me and I doubt they'll ever invent one that can."

"How much is the sword worth?"

"3 million flat...and much more than either of our lives. So unfortunately...I'm gonna have to take it from you."

Just then MEL let out a siren like blare, "WARNING!!! WARNING!!! System override, unauthorized entry of docking bay! Ship class Wolfen!"

"Looks like you've got company..." Slash chuckled, "...might wanna hurry it up."

Lament took his weapons and rushed off down the halls toward the docking bay only to find that there was indeed a Wolfen just landing, it's wing formation was a bit different and it was blue instead of read but it was definitely a Wolfen. As the pilot leaped from the cockpit and removed her helmet Lament was speechless; if it hadn't been for this vixen's white fur she could have passed for Kursed in a heartbeat, she wore a black and red uniform that reached from her collar to her thighs, knee high boots and a pari of long gloves that reached bast her elbows, her eyes were an enticingly beautiful shade of green. She pulled an unusually long sword from as sheath on her side, and rocked her head from shoulder to shoulder a few times before smiling beautifully...if not sadistically...

"Mmmm...you're a lot cuter than Slash made you out to be." Her voice sung as she licked her lips.

Lament wasted no time pulling out both his sword and Lovithar, "And you would be?"

"Fyra..." She proclaimed running her free hand through her long hair, "...now I'm supposed to get that sword from you by any means necessary. Oh please tell me we have to be violent with this." She pleaded.

"Wow...and I thought Kursed was a little off..." Lament said with a chuckle, "...but you're a downright psychotic bitch."

"No...I'm not psychotic..." Fyra said as her sword became limp and fell to the ground, "...Oh ho ho ho...but I am a bitch, you have no idea how right you were about that." She finished with a flick of her wrist.

Lament winced a something struck the tip of his nose with the loud lashing crack of a whip leaving a semi-deep cut in the sensitive flesh...

"Living sword...those are pretty rare." Lament said his eyes watering a bit from the sting of the cut.

Living swords were a maniacal combination of sword and whip, the blade though solid was segmented, and held together by light but powerful cables, making each small segment of blade like flesh stripping razors. A gyro concealed in the hilt of the sword could pull the cables taught making it no more than a large longsword. Most people weren't stupid enough to use one as they were hard to handle and keep from hitting the person using them but, this vixen seemed well aware of what she was doing...

"Yes such beauty and lethality...just like me."

Lament let out a slight laugh, "You know I take back what I said..." He said, "...psychos aren't nearly this nuts."

Fyra let out a cry of pure anger as she swung her weapon toward Lament several times successfully tearing small cuts into the fabric of his shirt and long coat. As a particularly harsh crack of the weapon made a jump at Lament's face he lashed out against it with his sword causing the lethal whip to become entwined slightly around the blade giving him the opportunity to grasp the cable between two of the segments. He smiled to Fyra before pulling all of his strength into the whip launching her into the air, then whipping her airborne body into a nearby stack of fuel cells. Fyra stood up smiling and yanked on her own end of the weapon, Lament attempted to hold onto his end where his sword was attached but, to his great surprise she was stronger than he had anticipated. He flew forward toward Fyra rolling across the ground, Fyra then lashed out at him with her whip sword. Lament quickly rolled to one side as her blade slashed a large scrape into the metal floor, she kept up her pace but attack after attack collided with the floor as Lament rolled out of the way in each direction; first rolling onto the back of his neck, then rolled forward, then back to his original position into a forward handspring stomping down on the whip as he landed. Fyra pulled the whip again which caused Lament to fall backwards stopping his decent with one hand flipping over to his feet. He dove backward as another flick from the tip of the snake like weapon bit into his thigh and hid behind a stack of storage boxes, unfortunately another crack of her whip sounded...

There was a slightly shocked look frozen on Lament's face as the middle box of the five box stack slid away from itself at an angle dropping the stack. He knew that her weapon was sharp but, this was ridiculous, he wasn't even safe under cover. He attempted several times to finally get close enough to her to attack her, but her weapon had a much better range than any of his...As their fight carried on a light crack from her weapon bounded off of his sword, and before she could recoil the whip she made another lightning fast motion. Lament let out a scream of pain as the blades dug into his calf, the whip's long tail wrapping about his leg. The long weapon tore at his muscle as she forcefully pulled the whip loose, the unbelievable pain forcing him to his knees, another flick of her wrist stripped the swords form his hands.

"Don't feel too badly dear...nobody beats me..." Fyra said retracting her sword to it's normal state, "...well then it's too bad Slash wants you to himself..." She added placing her sword's point to Lament's throat, "...otherwise I'd keep you for myself. Sweet dreams handsome."

The heel of her boot collided with the side of his head and his vision blanked out...

**(Two hours later...)**

Kursed entered Papetoon's orbit and waited, she knew that this was where Lament was headed but he should have been there. It didn't make any sense...he had a job to collect on...he was never late where money was involved. After a few hours of waiting Kursed began to have the oddest feeling that she was missing something...that Lament's ship should have been there, she thought long and hard on where he might have gone otherwise but she didn't really think the same way he did. She waited a bit longer until it grew to a late hour...

"CAM...have their been any odd warp jumps in the last few hours here?"

"Connecting with CHSA..." CAM said going silent as she began downloading the information, "...276 warp jumps in the last 10 hours."

"Did any seem out of place?"

There was a silent moment, "Majority number of warp jumps destined for Corneria and Katina...One jump scheduled for Titania."

Kursed thought to herself for a moment...what did she have to loose other than time? "Get us a cleared hyperspace path to Titania...I got a bad feeling about this."

CAM went silent for a moment, "Registered flight path granted...ETA 4 hours 27 minute."

**(Meanwhile elsewhere in Lylat...)**

Lament could feel the burning cold of a stone floor, he was freezing, and his entire body hurt. He could taste blood that seeped into his mouth from a cut on his lip, and he could feel an agonizing pain in his left leg. As his vision cleared from his recent unconscious stupor he noticed his room; it's walls were all made up of stone but the bars that formed his cell door were most definitely iron, what was meant as a bed was no more than a wooden plank held to the wall by two chains, the only other occupant seemed to have expired several years back as he was no more than a pile of bones in one corner. He tried to stand up but collapsed to the ground screaming in pain as his left ankle buckled beneath him. As he examined the injured foot it became clear that he wouldn't be doing a lot of moving, his Achilles tendon had nearly been cut in two. Leaving his coat alone he removed his tattered shirt tearing it into strips...one of the thicker leg bones of his roommate made a perfect splint for the injury before he wrapped it tightly...

The hours passed slowly, Lament was beginning to feel groggy...he hadn't eaten in more than a few hours. Finally a wolf in a red uniform walked by the cell sliding a tray of...food...under the door. Lament didn't care what it looked like it was food and he was hungry; though the contents of the tray seemed to have already been digested once or twice. He wasn't given any utensils for eating, a smart choice as he'd once killed a hare with a spoon, the memory of the incident forced up a small chuckle. When he finished silencing his growling stomach he decided to check over the things he had on him...

"Lets see..." He said sitting down on his wooden bed, "...communicator...broken, one silver ring, and my personal voice transmitter...but the damn thing only works within 200 meters of another unit..."

"So you're awake." A voice said from the cell door.

Lament turned to see the white vixen that had attacked him, "Well...if it isn't Psychobitch. What the fuck do you want?"

He could tell by the look on her face that his nickname had gotten to her, "I just needed to inform you that as of today you belong to me...sort of an engagement present from Slash."

"The Nutcase, Psychobitch wedding...you two must be so happy."

"We'll see how cocky you are once the arena's been fixed up...you'd best get some sleep."

The hours slipped by, Lament busied himself constructing what weapons he could from his roommate's bones and whatever other things he could find around the place. So far he managed to make knives of several different lengths, as well as a few stabbing weapons, sharpening them by rubbing them against the rough stone for hours on end... he didn't know what they had planned but it couldn't have been good or fair by any account...after all they were going to put him in an arena with a useless ankle...and though he didn't know what he'd be fighting, he knew that it would be useless to even try in his current state. But if he was even going to try he needed some sleep...

Lament was awakened in the darkness of the night by the sound of his cell door opening, he tightened the grip on one of his homemade weapons. He could hear the sound of a limp body hitting the floor...

"Is she gonna be alright?"

"Yeah...well, as far as the anti-venom goes, but who knows what this sick bastard'll do to her..."

"Oh well...little action before he dies tomorrow." The other guard laughed as they walked away.

**(000)**

Kursed woke with a blinding headache, the burning in her side felt familiar in a way. She could feel a stiff surface beneath her, and she could hear a voice though it seemed far off and hazy...

"You alright?"

She could only nod as she couldn't find her voice...

"I guess we both kinda fucked up this time huh?"

She nodded weakly, wincing in pain...

After some time Kursed was able to sit up, as she did Lament sat a plate of food on the bed next to her before leaning against the far wall sliding into a sitting position cringing at the pain in his foor...

"I know it looks like crap but...you gotta eat something." Lament said, "How the hell did you get here anyhow? And where are we anyway?"

Kursed obviously hadn't eaten in a short while as she swallowed a large portion of food, "We're on Titania...I found your ship in orbit and thought you were just trying to throw me off from chasing you...but when I got down here I was attacked, a killed quite a few of them but...one of those little scorpion freaks got me from behind. I woke up in here..." She pointed to Lament's tattered ankle, "...what the hell happened to you?"

"The whole fucking job was a set up..." Kursed slowly climbed off of the bed and crept over to examine Lament's ruined foot, "...that was done by some crazy bitch named Fyra with a living sword. She's in cahoots with a crazy bastard that tried to kill me a few years back..."

"Yeah there seems to be a lot of that going around...you're like a magnet for trouble." Kursed replied, "Look...if we're going to get out of here...you're going to need this foot. I can heal it but...it'll leave me pretty weak for a while."

"Well I can promise to keep you safe until you regain your strength."

Kursed shook her head and closed her eyes before placing his palms together rubbing them together. His eyes grew wide as he watched a blue flame erupt around her hand as she reached for his muzzle. Lament quickly pulled his muzzle from her grip...

"You're gonna have to trust me here...This hurts like hell..."

Lament was hesitant but, this time he didn't recoil when she clamped his muzzle shut. She closed her eyes and quickly slapped her flaming hand to the injured ankle; a muffled scream echoed from Lament's closed muzzle and down the empty halls. He could instantly feel every cell and muscle fiber being stitched back together slowly the whole time his limb felt like it was on fire burning on the inside. As the final length of the healing fell through his vision was blurring, and the pain finally got to him...he blacked out...and as the process was finished Kursed too lost consciousness from the exertion of her own power falling over his legs...

As the world inside the cell faded back into existence, Lament pushed Kursed off of his legs, thanks to the dead weight of her exhausted body they were completely unresponsive..but after a few minutes the circulation returned and Lament laid the downed medic on the cell's bed. Now he owed her one, he guaranteed the unconscious vixen that she'd be paid back but at the moment he was busy testing his repaired ankle. It had a full range of motion again but, moving it still hurt a bit, though not agonizingly so...it was a tolerable pain now. About another hour passed by and a passing guard slid breakfast into the cell. This was different than before however, this meal was full of meat and pleasant smelling foods that Lament was accustomed to eating, no to mention a full bottle of Scotch, he took the two metal plates and walked over to the bed where he made sure to wake Kursed before handing her a plate...

Kursed was still a bit groggy but didn't refuse the meal, she needed to rebuild her strength, "What's the deal? Good food and liquor?"

Lament glanced over to her from his position on the floor then back to his food, "...Last meal..." He said taking a heavy drink of the Scotch shivering a bit as he pulled the bottle away from his lips, "...that means they're going to do this arena thing this afternoon." He said passing her the bottle.

Kursed didn't really drink but considering the circumstances at hand she snatched the bottle taking a healthy swig herself, then handed the bottle back to Lament, "...(cough)...not bad." Her eyes watered and she found it a bit hard to breathe for a moment, she obviously wasn't used to drinking.

A few hours later they'd emptied their plates and most of the Scotch. It wasn't long before four guards with heavy machine guns came to their cell and began to lead Lament and Kursed down a big empty hall. Kursed was forced to ignore the fact that the echidna behind her had pinched her ass...she made a note of his face as the guards left her and Lament in another cell. A much larger cell who's only stone wall was dominated by a massive double door...

"You know kid...I'm gonna miss the good old days." Lament said as they noticed the massive door opening.

"What good old days?" Kursed yelled over a roar of what sounded like screaming spectators.

The doors swung fully open revealing them to the piercing sunlight, "The days when the only crazy bitch trying to kill me was you."

Kursed couldn't help but laugh, the same as Lament as the two enemies forced into a peaceful partnership made their way out into what could very well be their end...

**(AN: You know it's weird I've never actually created a rough draft of any of this stuff but...I've already plotted out the entire story...Does that sound weird to anyone other than me? Anyhow the next Chs will have quite a bit of explicit gore and I can however promise that I am already working on the second part to the full story...but since I sux with title it'll just be called The Fox's Lament II...and it'll probably have some sort of subtitle. Thax to all who actually read the fic. Remember to R&R people...I really like hearing your opinions, good and bad...)**


	11. A Deadly Game pt 2

**Chapter 11**: A Deadly Game pt 2

Lament looked to Kursed then his surroundings; the arena Fyra had mentioned was exactly what she said it was, a massive, round, stone colosseum...Lament recalled reading about them before, these places were scattered all over human history, but nothing he'd ever read about them was very pleasant. Immense battles, slaughtering the helpless, it was all sickening, unfortunately he was about to have a close encounter with the way some humans used to live. He blazing desert sun beat down on him as he examined the grounds, bones and fresh bodies lay strewn about the arena, large patches of sand were stained red with the blood of past warriors, the base of the walls that held the spectators high overhead, were lined with sharp stone spikes which made sure the participants couldn't get to the spectators. Kursed seemed to be in immense pain, all of the negative thoughts from the hundreds of onlookers were overwhelming her Telepathy...it felt like someone was spreading her skull apart...

"Shut up! SHUT UP!!"

Lament tried to help but, he wasn't psychic and had no way of helping her...she'd have to find a way to just control it...It was in instances like this where she was surrounded by negative emotion and thought that she'd always looked to Fox, she couldn't explain it but his presence had always made it easier to drown all other thoughts from her mind, but he was gone now. For some time Lament stood there trying to snap Kursed out of her pain but he himself became distracted as the entire stadium became eerily silent...

"Kursed?" He said nudging her with an elbow to no avail, "Yo! Now would be a good time to snap out of it..."

As he said this a familiar voice rose up over the silence, "Welcome to hell Lament!! My dear Fyra wants to see the extent of your skill! So I've taken the pleasure of giving you a little something to play with!!!" Slash's voice echoed over the still silence.

As Slash spoke another set of doors across the arena grounds slowly opened; four large characters stepped out into the open, they were clad in strange armor that consisted of a skull cap, and metal plates that covered choice parts of their bodies, their chests were left exposed for the most part. Lament could instantly tell that one was a Sharpclaw from Sauria carrying a massive axe, the one to his immediate left was most definitely a wolf who rested his grip on the handle of a massive sword that extended from his back some ways barely not touching the ground, the next of the four Lament was raven who wasn't carrying a weapon of any kind, the last was carrying a pari of longswords, she was clearly a raccoon...

"Fyra is a very good judge of character don't you think!? These animals are her personally trained guardsmen! Enjoy yourselves! I know I will!"

Lament knelt down beside Kursed who still seemed to be unable to fight, he stealthily took out one of the knives he'd made and slid it down the front of her uniform, concealing it between her breasts, to anyone in the audience what they saw could have been mistaken for a hug as Lament drew his muzzle near her ear...

"Can you still hear me?"

Kursed nodded slight...

"If any of them get too close use it...I know you're in pain so just sit back and let me handle this."

Lament stood up and stretched his back, a rough series of cracking sounds, the group of guards simply stood there studying Lament who flared out his long coat and stepped forward...

"So! Who's first!?"

The four exchanged some muffled words that were inaudible to Lament on his side of the arena; after a moment the Saurian slammed a fist into his own chest shouting something then held his axe high over his head. The unusually large and muscular wolf stepped to one side and made a motion as if inviting his partner to have his way with Lament. The Saurian let out a roar and rushed toward Lament...Lament simply stood his ground and rolled his eyes. The dinosaur hefted his axe into the air as he approached Lament who reached into the back of his coat; as he got close enough the Saurian made a large swipe at Lament's head...but, the nimble fox bent backward a bit allowing the axe to swipe past his nose. As the Sharpclaw recovered his heavy axe Lament shot back into an upright position and with both fists pounding away at the monster's body landing several blows across his chest ending by landing a spinning backhand into the Saurian's face. The dinosaur stood still for a few moments his arms twitching violently before Lament pulled his fist away from the creatures face allowing the body to fall lifelessly to the sand, a small wound in the attacker's forehead spewed blood as it was uncorked by the small bone knife held in Lament's hand...the arena was filled with the dull whispers and shocked gasps of the spectators at the spectacle at hand...

Lament stood over the Saurian, "NEXT!!" He yelled .

The three remaining didn't seem to know what to do, they seemed a bit shocked, to them Lament didn't look like much of a threat...he was not nearly as big as they were...and to their knowledge had been completely unarmed. The wolf then pointed to Lament and the other two remaining guards rushed in at much greater speeds than the dispatched Saurian. Lament had found their routine; power first, then speed, and to his only guess the last one...the wolf was the skill. The one that rushed upon Lament, which he thought was unarmed, turned out otherwise. The raven's feathered fists were wrapped by gauntlets specially made for dealing death; eache knuckle was tipped by a small spike, the fingertips of the gauntlets were clawed, and each had a foot long blade extending over her fists from the middle of her wrists. Lament ducked the bird's first punch but, the attack was a fake as her knee struck him in the face forcing him to the ground, where Lament rolled through the fall back onto his feet. The raccoon didn't seem half as interested in Kursed who she simply held under her foot. Lament quickly pulled a bone knife and hurled it at the raccoon which penetrated the creature's muscular abs...forcing out a scream of pain as she dropped her weapons, the scream had been enough to snap Kursed out of her painful state, who rolled toward the injured raccoon scooping up both swords, swiping the blades through her arm pits severing them at the shoulders, with this new pain the raccoon fell to her knees before having her own blades thrust into her eyes and out the back of her skull...

Lament at the time had his hands full, the avian was fast and strong, and had obvious martial arts training...he knew how strong her kicks were and was happy that the gauntlets hadn't hit him. As they squared off the avian's constant assault was driving Lament toward the door they'd come in through. Another series of punches caught up with Lament, a blade cut into his forehead, and another on his chest until she finally jammed one of the blades into his shoulder pushing him into the door, She started to bring a fist down to his face but Lament reached out and caught her by the hand interlocking his fingers with hers. He then pulled her other hand away from his shoulder, then pulled her arms into the door behind him forcing the blades quite a distance into the door. Having her arms stuck she snapped at his face several times with her beak only to have Lament's paw latch onto her beak, thrusting her face upward until he could hear the crunch of her vertebrates shattering. Her wrists snapped as Lament moved letting her dead weight fall against the door. Lament then noticed that Kursed was unconscious, the wolf had gotten to her as he was standing there with his sword held to her chest...

"I'll give you credit..." The wolf said as Lament approached him, "...we underestimated you...not even afraid to kill a woman."

"Killing is a funny things..." Lament said stopping at the raccoon's body long enough to dislodge the swords from her face, "...gets easier and easier the more you do it. Before you know it...just as natural as breathing."

The wolf turned his gaze to the vixen for a moment, "Is she in your future Lament?"

"She is...she'll eventually end my life. As for you however..." Lament replied pointing one of the two swords at the wolf, "...you are just like this rabble..." He added making a wide motion with his other arm, "...you don't have a future. You were a dead man as soon as you stepped through that door behind you. Because like it or not my only way out of here is thru you...but don't worry...I'll make this quick..."

Lament didn't waste any time with this one, he rushed forward, the wolf hefted his massive sword into the air preparing to cleave the fox in two. As the mammoth sword threatened to crush him, Lament rolled forward driving his swords into the wolf's armored feet forcing a shrill howl to rush past the wolf's lips. His cries of pain were cut short as Lament leaped up from his crouched position slamming the top of his own skull into the wolf's jaw creating a sickening sound as his teeth and jawbone shattered form the gathered force behind the strike. As the wolf fell to the ground Lament landed on his chest and without second thought latched his jaws onto the wolf's neck; the sick crunch of the wolf's larynx was followed by a loud gurgling sound as blood rushed into the wolf's throat flooding his lungs, his violently shaking limbs caused the enraged fox to bite harder forcing the blood to explode into his mouth as his fangs severed the wolf's jugular artery. With one last crunch Lament jerked his neck to one side taking everything in his powerful jaws with him,, causing the wolf's body to convulse into an epileptic fit spraying blood everywhere until all signs of life faded...Kursed had been fortunate enough to regain consciousness just in time to watch Lament finish the job, who spit out a large mass of flesh, bone, fur, blood and cartilage...

Lament laughed a bit, "What's so funny?" Kursed asked.

"He tasted horrible..." Lament laughed some more spitting out more and more of the blood that flooded his mouth.

Kursed couldn't help but to laugh...it was one of the stupidest things she'd ever heard. As Lament helped her to her feet two guards jammed rifles into his back. He instantly took the hint tossing the small knife of bone to the ground...the two quickly searched him , but when they came up with nothing they turned him and Kursed to face the door where the dead raven was still hanging. High above the door on a balcony Fyra and Slash stood with an arm around each other...

"Good show Lament..." Slash declared, "...I expected nothing less from the fox that took my eye."

"Now take them away..."

The guards backed away giving Lament and Kursed the room to get in front of them, as soon as they were a sutible distance from the guards Lament lowered his head...

"Listen...when we get into the halls just play along alright, I'm getting us out of here." He whispered lightly.

'_I hope you know what you're doing.' _Kursed's voice echoed into his skull telepathically.

_'God I wish I could do that...'_

**(000)**

As the guards led Lament and Kursed down the hall, Lament drew himself close to her side...the guards began to whisper to themselves as they saw this. Unexpectedly Lament pulled Kursed around in front of him forcing her into a kiss full of mock passion, as her eyes were still open from the shock Kursed noticed that it had gotten the guards's attention. Even more so when they saw Lament's paw snake it's way up to her breasts...the two guards didn't want this to go any further and began to jam their rifles into Lament's back who broke their fake kiss with a huge grin...

"Yo break it up you two..." One guard said.

"No problem boss..."

Lament turned into a fast spin slashing the hidden knife he'd retrieved from Kursed's uniform as the guards were distracted by the vulpines's false passion,, Motion sprayed Lament in even more blood as his hidden attack had slashed a deep wound in the throat of both of the guards who both fell to the ground. Lament picked up both of the rifles handing one to Kursed who was still in a bit of shock, Lament had laid that whole act on a little thick and suddenly...

"Hey you alright?"

Kursed quickly snapped out of her shock and slammed her fist into Lament's face, then stuck the barrel of her rifle to his eye, "You had no call to touch me like that."

"HeyHeyHey...sorry but it wasn't exactly a fully thought out plan..." Lament said, "...but look at the results; those morons are dead and we have guns now...It worked! Or maybe you'd have liked to spend another night in the cell! I don't know about you but kissing someone I don't like...or even hate is a lot better than dying here! Neither of us was going to keep that up forever! They'd have eventually gotten tired of us and would have just put a bullet in my head at least...I don't want to think about what they might have done to you!" Lament scolded her, "Sometimes you just have to swallow your god damn pride in order to get what you want! Now get the rifle away from my eye and lets get the fuck out of here before these douche bags are missed..." He finished kicking one of the bodies.

Kursed pulled the rifle away and rested it at her side...

"Now that we understand each other...were you conscious when they carried you through here?"

Kursed thought to herself for a moment, "Only up to the hanger which isssss...tttthat way I think." She said pointing down the hall, in the opposite direction of the cell.

The two hid the guards's bodies and headed off not knowing what would happen next, but they did know that they needed to get to Lament's ship at the least...

**(This chapter turned out a bit shorter than I thought it would...but was also pretty Fing violent soooo...I think those traits kind of cancel each other out. The next chapter will be up soon. I'd also like to know how you think this fic should end? Should Kursed kill Lament ? How should she feel about it? Maybe Fox should be revived with the sword and kill Lament himself...I'd really like to hear your opinion.)**


	12. A Deadly Game pt 3

**Chapter 12**: A Deadly Game pt 3

**(AN: I think anyone who actually likes this fic may like the ending...even though it's going to lead to a sequal...remember that your opinion is important people...)**

The rooms of the area seemed to all be the same, empty spaces connected by empty corridors, it was only after finding the main gates out of the arena that they found themselves in the midst of a ruined city. Some of the structures had been rebuilt with modern flair though they were still made of stone. The long catwalk nearby that led away from the arena was lined with massive stone pillars, there was no telling how tall each was but most were at least half destroyed, but far in the distance Lament could make out the tall tail wing of his ship. Lament took cover behind one of the mammoth structures as he saw something Kursed followed...

"What are you doing? It's clear..."

Lament scoffed, "Take a close look toward the buildings near just below the wing from my ship..."

Kursed leaned out a bit and stared squinting into the glare of the bright sun; at first she saw only sand and stone buildings but, something moved slowly across the sand...it was a small swell parting the sand like the dorsal fin of a shark parts water. 

"Is that what I think it is?" Kursed whispered.

"Yeah...I noticed it when they attacked me before..." Lament pointed out, "...I don't think they can see too well, more like sonar...and that's a real problem, the solid ground around here to a creature like that...perfect sound conductor..." Lament noticed Kursed aiming her rifle at the shifting sand but, quickly stopped her, "Are you nuts? At this range...even it you hit your mark, there wouldn't be any penetration."

As they sat there thinking Lament looked at Kursed, a devious smile spread across his face, "Do you know where your spear is?"

"When they drug me through the hanger they left it in a pile of stuff...why?"

Lament pulled out a single grenade and smiled, "I liberated this from one of those guards...let's see how stupid these things are...I got 20 bucks says at least one grabs it." He said bouncing the explosive up and down in his paw.

"You're on..." Kursed said.

Lament pulled the pin and lobbed the device the 50 or 60 yards to the patch of sand where the creatures were swimming in the sand. As soon as it impacted the sand the two lumps in the sand rushed over to it...Lament smiled a bit anticipating that he'd won the childish bet...he lost hope but the device vanished below the sand. The blast was slightly muffled by the sand. The two vulpines ignored the fact that Lament had just won their bet and rushed through the open area...though the blast was slightly muffled by the sand it would definitely draw attention to the hanger where the ships were being held. As they moved through the spaces between the buildings random animals began to rush toward them though in small numbers, Lament and Kursed's combined fire tore through whatever lines they formed as the alleyways they rushed through gave no room to take cover...

As soon as they broke into the hanger Lament knocked Kursed to one side causing her to slide behind a mass of junk taken from the ships. At the same time diving to the opposite side, just in time for the mass of soldiers to open fire...a stray bullet struck Lament in the foot...

"I found it..." Kursed called showing her spear.

"Good toss me the rifle..." 

Kursed didn't hesitate in sliding the gun across the stone floor, Lament scooped the weapon up into his other hand...

"As soon as I start shooting you get to your ship..."

"What about you?" Kursed asked.

"When did you start caring about that? Just go..."

Lament stood exposing himself above the crate he used for cover...the rapid spray of hot lead was unexpected as it caught the guards off guard, a multitude didn't move fast enough to get to cover as they were riddled with bullet wounds. Unfortunately one of Lament weapons emanated the whirring sound of a gear grinding on another, followed by a few short clicks...

"FUCK!" Lament yelled throwing the jammed gun and ducking back to his cover.

_'What happened?' _Kursed's asked inside his head.

"The fucking thing jammed..." Lament replied out loud.

_'What now then I'm pinned down back here.'_

"Plan-B...get ready to do that fireball thing..."

Lament reached for a nearby fuel cell; everyone knew a that a plasma cell set on fire was as good as any bomb. Lament hurled the cell as far as he could near a spot where about six soldiers were taking cover...Kursed peeked from her cover near her ship and fired a bolt of red energy at the fuel cell...the soldiers never saw it coming as the ball of flames slammed into the cylindrical cell. The blast was several times what the grenade had been earlier, sending the soldiers and their severed limbs in all sorts of directions; a fox in particular slammed into the hull of Lament's ship with a force that left a massive red splotch of blood. The shock wave from the blast had knocked Lament on his ass. Lament laughed, "Holy shit that was a big boom!" He hadn't really expected the explosion to be half as big as it was. Unfortunately that was the only cell anywhere near him, all he had now was a half spent machine gun. He took a quick peek around his cover to see Kursed rush into her ship. The gunfire from the enemies had died down and Lament took this time to search the small area for anything even close to a weapon, all he found was an old rusty screwdriver. 

"Hey can you still hear me?"

_'Yeah...'_

"How many are there left?"

_'Eight...hang on one's coming around on your left...'_

Just as the words came to Lament a soldier slid on the ground aiming a rifle at Lament; unfortunately his nose slid right into the barrel of Lament's rifle...the burst fire of the weapon let off three rounds tearing away the side of the animal's face...he then claimed the SMG that the fox had; a bit larger than a normal gun with an extended clip. He was happy enough that the thing was more than half full of bullets...

_'They're coming in on both sides now...'_

Lament settled over his options as he took in his surroundings...a small board with four wheels sat nearby, the kind mechanics would use to get under a vehicle. He quickly grabbed the board...

"God I haven't done this since I was 16."

The guards leaped into Lament's cover only to see him leap over the nearby crates landing on the crawler like a skateboard, gliding him across the stone floor. He whipped his vehicle around facing the enemies unleashing all the ammo of the two weapons he had...one of the bullets he'd fired turned out to be one of those one in a million shots striking a grenade one of them had strapped to his belt. The explosion sent the animals in several directions, there wasn't even anything left of the one that had the grenade...

"Lucky shot!" Kursed yelled as she emerged from her small ship.

"Why didn't you leave?"

Kursed rushed over to a nearby command console, "There was another ship in here when I came in...I think those two creeps left...with the sword."

"What's the big deal it's just a sword...?" Lament asked checking his injured foot.

"Weren't you listening to Belladonna?" Kursed shouted, "They could resurrect anyone if they find a way to activate the spell in that sword. Even Andross."

"Sorry kid but, that's hardly my problem..." Lament said limping toward her ship.

As he made his way toward the Raven a gunshot sounded off, a wound burst from Lament's shoulder, almost in instant reaction Lament spun and hurled something at his shooter's face. The wolf had caught Kursed by surprise and held her at gunpoint when he shot lament, though he was fortunate enough that the blast from the grenade his friend held didn't kill him, his aim suffered. The object thrown from Lament drove itself forcefully into the wolf's left eye, his death wasn't instant as he fell to the ground screaming, he was quickly silenced by the point of Kursed's spear as she drove it into his forehead...

"Haven't you ever cared about anything other than yourself?"

Lament turned to face her, "Yeah!...Once...and look what the fuck it did to me! I'm tired of living like this...every day is another attempt on my life! You have no idea how badly I just want to stand still when they shoot at me!"

"Then why don't you!" Kursed yelled back, "If it's so hard to live...then why do you fight so god damn hard to stay alive!"

"Because I still love her..."

Kursed was a bit speechless, she hadn't expected that answer...It was the memory of his lost love that kept him from just laying down and dying. She didn't have time to think on it though, she transferred whatever data she could to her ship. When the Raven took off Kursed was forced to shield her eyes from the dust that was picked up. No sooner then the Raven left the hanger was her own ship in the air. She decided that she needed to find out if there was a second alter built and if so where it was...there was only one person that would be able to find out such a thing, but at the time there was no telling where Xander and Arlex had gone after their run in on Titania, now that they had a new ship they could be anywhere in the star system in hopes of uncovering anything new in their exploration, but they often searched uncharted planets so that was where she'd start. She caught a short glimpse of the Raven when she broke atmosphere just as it leaped into hyperspace. She still found it hard to understand...when she'd first started tracking him she thought Lament was no more than a heartless, soulless killer who simply built his career around those he killed...but now she questioned everything that she knew about him, when the time came she didn't know if she'd even be able to kill him...when leaving him alive would be a far greater punishment...

**(Somewhere in the Lylat System)**

**May 3****rd**\/p

**11:15am GST**

Days had passed by and Lament had nothing but his painful memories to keep him company, as MEL had been destroyed, or dismantled by the mechanics that were most likely planning on stripping down the Raven to see what they could use on their own ships. Because of this Lament was forced to stay away from his normal drink of Scotch so he relied on his second favorite drink, a health drink that was sold almost everywhere...though he couldn't really pronounce the exotic name of the drink he did like it's blended flavors of different fruits. MEL was also his mechanic so he was forced to repair anything wrong with the ship himself, as well he'd nearly been arrested on Papetoon when he had his wounds taken care of at the hospital in Targer City. He was tempted the other night to take out the entire bottle of Scotch that he'd been taking small drinks of here and there. He couldn't explain it but, the alcohol had lost it's effect, the more he drank the more her memory was forced back into his head finally forcing him to throw the bottle into the wall. That same night he demolished every bit of liquor on the ship, he'd never touch a bottle again...

His days became filled with nothing more than the maintenance of his ship, and an absurd amount of training after having gotten his ass handed to him by Fyra. The more he trained however the more he thought about his old team. He'd done them no extent of wrong...and worse he'd never apologized. His days without the alcohol had made him remember what his life once was. He used to have so much fun flying his arwing, doing missions for whoever called on him...maybe that was the answer. Stop being so serious all the time and lay off the fucking alcohol intake...He wanted to send his old teammates an apology. He found out what he wanted to do. He always had a backup to MEL's CPU and had integrated it into the ship's main computer...

"MEL...take me to Sauria..."

Five minutes went by, "Confirmation acquired...destination Sauria...ETA approximately 10 hours."

"Just get this old piece of shit moving alright?"

**(Lylat Palms resort and Space station...about 22,000 light-years from Titania...)**

The past few days had been pretty hard to handle. Her ship had started acting up recently and needed some maintenance, and she was in no way a mechanic. She really didn't like the idea of the place she'd chosen to get the work done but, it really needed to be taken care of a.s.a.p...the only real reason she didn't like this particular space station was because of the memory that it revived. Fox had once taken her to the resort on a date, it was here that she let her feeling for him be known...where they shared their first kiss. It was times like these that she simply stayed to herself...she decided that this was a more than an opportune time to get in a bit of recreation, her ship could take more than a single day to repair...there were electrical failures all over the place...The lead mechanic had informed her that most of the problems were pretty minor accept for the fact that her engines were on their last leg, apparently all the time she spent chasing Lament from one star system to another had finally taken it's toll on her ship, it would be expensive but luckily she'd been paid quite a bit for the job she did on Kew about a month ago...

"Maybe a little fun time is in order...haven't had much time for myself..." Kursed said to herself rolling over to look at the ceiling, "...sitting here in my room sure isn't helping anything."

She got up and packed a small suitcase full of clothes, "Knowing my luck something bad'll happen before I can even get into the spa."

**(Planet Sauria)**

**10:19am**

**May 4th**\/p

Lament had been there for some time, he'd always told Belladonna that he'd help her fix up her hut, but had never done so. This time however it grew into the late hours and he still went about fixing things...there was something else odd that she noticed about Lament; not once did he call her 'bitch' or 'old hag' every time he said something to her. He had spent hours fulfilling his wasted promises, one by one; he rebuilt her roof, fixed the door as it had been broken during the last strong storm, he even managed to draw out plans for a system that would bring her fresh water from the well although that would take some time to set up. He'd also been working with Belladonna to get all the information they could on Slash's location...

Lament had his arms full of fresh flowers, "So you're going to visit her."

"Yeah...I'll be back..." Lament replied, "...just do me a favor and get my sword from my arwing...I'm going to need it to finish the roof when I get back...I really need to get you some tools next time I go to Katina for supplies."

Lament took his time walking to the well, he took in the salty sea air...he'd always loved the smell, from the very first time he'd come to Sauria, he'd never forget it. He took his time climbing down the seemingly endless numbers of ladders. He again walked to the gravestone where he carefully laid down the mass of flowers carefully situating them around the slab of stone...Unlike last time he didn't say anything. He simply sat there and began to clean off the headstone as he noticed that the name on the headstone had been worn off. He ran his fingers over the spot where her name was...

"Guess I'll have to engrave that again huh?" Lament said standing up. "I'll come down her to fix this place up tomorrow...some of the flowers look pretty bad."

Lament made his way back up the well to the small cave that lead back out to the cape but turned back to look down at the grave again before heading back to the hut...He couldn't help but to smile just at the thought of her...His voice echoed through the well even as he left the spot...

"I love you..." 


	13. Findings

**Chapter 14**: Findings...

**(..Heavenly Arms Hotel, room 373; Lylat Palms..)**

**10:29am**

Kursed had been everywhere in the two days she'd been on the space station...she hoped that she'd receive a message from Xander and Arlex before the day was up, the lead mechanic working on her ship informed her that they would be done by morning. She made sure to spend a bit of money spoiling herself...she even ordered a suite instead of an economy room...even though she refused to sleep on the overly comfortable bed...like so many other things it reminded her of Fox. She at the moment however was in use of the only real reason that she ordered the room...the 'hot tub'...Fox had introduced her to them a short time after they were on their first date. She found them to be absolutely perfect for relaxing sore muscles and stress...Stress that was something she had far too much of these days. Which didn't help with her conflicting thoughts about Lament...it seemed to her the more often they talked the more depressed and emotional she found him to be...

_'I can't believe it...but I feel sorry for him Fox.'_

Her thoughts about the heartbroken fox reminded her of herself in a lot of ways; they both fought for the memory of a loved one, they'd both lost a lover, and they were both pained by the memory of that loved one. 

_'I wonder what he'd doing right now...probably running like usual...'_

**(Sauria...)**

Lament approached Belladonna's hut dropping a large load of firewood that she'd eventually need when the winter rolled in...It was already getting relatively cold in the morning, and Belladonna didn't work so well in the cold an her much older joints tended to give her much grief in the colder months. Lament walked into the hut to a friendly old smile and a hot cup of coffee. Belladonna sat by as Lament began to cook up something fore breakfast, she'd always enjoyed Lament's cooking...

"So I take it you'll be leaving soon?"

"Sometime soon I suppose...there are a lot of wrongs that I need to set in order."

"What's gotten into you? Not that this isn't a welcome change in your attitude..." Belladonna asked.

Lament smiled and even chuckled a bit, "I did some soul searching..."

"And what did you find?"

"That I still have one..." Lament answered adding a Puk Puk egg to what he was cooking, "...and that even though she's gone...I still have reasons to live. The reason it all felt so helpless is because I'd forgotten about all the people that cared. And even if they no longer care about me...the fact is that I still care about them."

"That's good to hear..." Belladonna replied, "...you know most Cerinians go through what you've been through at one point or another in their life. Especially at the loss of a loved one, a grieving Cerinian will go out in search of themselves...to find new meaning to their life..sometimes however the search can last some time you were just one of the fortunate cases who find their answer within the first few years..."

Lament finished what he was cooking and set down two plates, "Bella...you once asked me about my past...and I have to say that I...well I reacted like a dick...and I'm sorry."

Belladonna took a large bite of her food, "All is forgiven but...I am still very interested in the matter."

Lament hesitated as they ate, the silence lasted some time, until he surprised the old Cerinian by speaking up, "I used to be...well a lot different. My friends were my life and family then...I lost both of my parents when I was still very young..."

"I'm sorry..." Belladonna interrupted, "..oh...umm...please continue."

"...Anyway...after so long I began to travel with a small group of friends. Doing mercenary work here and there...until...until I met her..."

"Your lost mate?"

"Technically she wasn't my mate..." Lament said eating a bit more, "...we had a few dates...kissed a few times...but when it came down to it...I couldn't tell her how I really felt...there was just too much that could have gone wrong...and then it did..." Tears were beginning to form at the corners of Lament's eyes, "...she managed to tell me during one of our dates that she...loved me...I reacted the only way I could, I said it back. Nothing could have ever made me happier...but...then things began to get complicated. My team was becoming familiar with some pretty bad people and there was the war and...I had to force her away..."

"I'm guessing that didn't blow over too well..."

"You know...it didn't hurt when she punched me in the face, or even when she kicked me..." By now Lament's tears fell freely into the dish of food below him, "...but...the last words she said to me changed my life forever..._I hate you...I hope you never come back from the war_...So I didn't...I no longer had anything to go back to. I moved from one bar to another drinking my life away until this old hare gave me a second chance. He told me how this old pirate a long time ago had passed his name on hoping to create some sort of legacy...he went on to explain that the name somehow made all of his sorrows go away, and that he himself was looking for one to take his place...his name was Tyrel Mayson before he inherited the name Lament. I saw no reason not to take his offer...I mean what the fuck did I have to loose right?..." Lament said wiping away his tears, "About a year passed before I heard the news...a small ship matching the identification of the one I'd sent her away in was found in the asteroid belt near Corneria...there was hardly anything left. Being Lament had given me a purpose in life again...but even if she hated my guts...I still loved her...the news drove me back to the bottle...and I slowly slipped further and further away from who I was. Then Kursed came along...swearing revenge on me..apparently I was accused of killing her lover or something like that...in those days of my drinking I could have...but...nonetheless her chasing me, it sparked something inside of me. The thrill of fighting and fleeing for my own life...it brought back all the good memories of being a mercenary..." Lament paused for a moment, "...but we were recently forced to work together to get off of Titania where she asked me something that hit me pretty hard..."

"And what did she ask you?"

"_Have you ever cared about anything other than yourself?_..." Lament smiled and chuckled, "...it was a ridiculous question...of course I had...but...it stuck with me for some reason...and even being drunk off my as for 24 straight hours didn't make it go away..it just proved her point. I did only care out myself or I wouldn't have tried to drown my problems in Scotch with every spare moment I got. It was then that I realized something...I had become the one thing that I hated the most...a lowlife..."

"Why not go back to your friends? I'd be willing to bet they miss you very much."

"I'm sure they do...but they have lives of their own now...they're both married and happy...I don't want to ruin that. My showing up...trust me...it would...err...complicate matters."

"Then what will you do?"

"Set as many things back in order as I can before I die...but to do that I need to find out where Slash and that Fyra girl disappeared to. Kursed was right...those two have something horrible in mind and I don't want to think about what it might be. If I guess right it's got something to do with the humans that used to live on Cerinia...It's also got something to do with the sword but...I can't put my finger on it...there's just some sort of angle that I'm missing..."

For the longest time the two remained silent, Lament had just laid on quite a bit. They went through their day and as night set in Lament helped the old one into bed, her's was upstairs. Then he returned to the one Kursed had used in the downstairs...

"Bella?" He started as he stared out the nearby window.

"What is it Lament?" Belladonna asked with a slight chuckle.

"A-are sins...ever forgiven?"

"Forgiveness is a complicated subject young one..." Belladonna replied, "...you could have it and not even know it...but if by forgiveness by the gods as long as you want it and ask it is most likely given..."

"What if you needed it from someone you've done no end wrong to?"

"You mean Kursed..." Belladonna pointed out, "...I am afraid only she herself could give you that...but I've seen the contents of her soul, she's looking for the same thing. She doesn't blame you for her lover's death, she blames herself...her pain goes a lot deeper than you think...and I'm afraid that if she doesn't learn to let it go...it will kill her."

Lament started to speak again but in the end there was nothing he could say, the old Cerinian had already fallen asleep. He however wasn't so lucky, his constant thoughts of what Belladonna had said kept him awake with a mass of questions that rushed through his head; _Who was he? Did I even kill him? What if I did? Is there any way to apologize for doing such a thing? I know I wouldn't be able to forgive my lover's killer, maybe I should just lay down and die like she said. That'd really convince her wouldn't it...blow my head own head off right in front of her..._He looked in the direction of the well_...but don't worry about that I know how you feel about suicide..._

His thoughts gave him no comfort, only the aggravation he felt for not being able to think of anything other then what he'd been told. It was late morning when he decided he couldn't take the pain of his own thoughts anymore...

**(000)**

_'whump'_

The loud thumping sound outside sounded like an Earthwalker parading through the area forcing Belladonna to wake rubbing the side of her old head...

_'whump, whump'_

Belladonna made her was groggily down to the floor where the sound began to grow in volume and rhythm, it was most definitely not an Earthwalker...the sounds were too loud and too close together...

_'whump, whump, WHUMP'_

The last sound was reminiscent of a gunshot she'd heard from one of Lament's pistols before, this caused her to rush outside, well at least as quickly as she could move. Her fears where laid to rest as she realized what was making the sound as it went off again...

_'whump whump WHUMP'_

Lament was standing nearby at an old palm tree...pummeling it's trunk mercilessly. Small splinters of wood showered him with every powerful strike. Belladonna smiled with a mixture of both relief and confusion as she watched through the blindness in her eyes. Lament had always been curious as to how she was able to see so well but, he figured it was just a Cerinian Telepathy trick of some kind...either way around it worried him sometimes watching a supposedly blind old vixen walking around so clearly...

"Lament...why are you beating on that defenseless tree?"

"Stress..." Lament answered delivering another one-two punch to the tree. "...it's either this or back to the bottle."

"Can't have that happening now can we? But is there a deeper reason for that particular tree's beating...I doubt he did anything to deserve such treatment."

Lament laughed a bit as he struck the tree with a particularly powerful kick, "I..." The anger welled up inside him again, "I...just...can't...fuckin'...Stand It!" He said delivering a powerful strike between each word with increasing strength, the last almost sounding like thunder, "I ruined her life...and I don't even have the decency to remember who he was or why it happened. I want her to forgive me but...do I even deserve it?"

As Lament said this his biceps tightened and he twisted his hips as he planted all of his force into the tree forming a massive indentation roughly twice the size of the vulpine's fist. As he turned to face Belladonna the two heard the loud sound of crackling thunder, followed by the sound of the trunk groaning. Lament pushed the old Cerinian a bit further back as the tall palm fell to the ground with a loud crash...

Belladonna made her way to the downed tree and took a seat on the severed end of the trunk, "Lament sit down." She said patting the space beside her, "I care for you a great deal young one...and trust me no one will be as surprised at how quickly you've changed your outlook that I am...it goes to prove just how strong a will you have to make such a radical change in yourself so quickly..." She went on as Lament sat down, "...I can sense that these feelings of yours are pure...but as much as I wish you could. You aren't going to find your answers in any number of these trees..."

Lament looked down at his knuckles. Though they were used to such treatment they were no more than small hills of blood and torn flesh and the base of his fingers now, he wouldn't be surprised if he'd broken several of them; his other weapons were no better, he could feel the trickle of blood soaking through his socks on the inside of his boots, "I guess there's only one place left to look then huh?"

"Yes...my question is; are you willing to risk your life for redemption?"

Lament chuckled very lowly as he looked at his feet, "I'm already dead Bella...redemption is all I have left."

Belladonna could think of nothing else to say, she simply lay an arm across Lament's slouching shoulders, she wasn't sure how to fully react to his current emotional state. This wasn't a side of the criminal she had never seen before. Lament was already working out a way to find out where Slash was, maybe the information would be a good start with Kursed, but where to start looking. He had left a scouting probe in Titania's orbit, but what if they had no intention of going back to Titania? He came to a realization of what he needed to do...

Several hours passed and Belladonna noticed that Lament was spending a lot of time working on his arwing, making sure everything was finely tuned before he gathered up his things and packed everything into the small ship's cargo bay...

Lament stuffed some things into the small hatch under the ship's hull pressing a button that made the hatch clamp shut, "You're leaving then?" Belladonna asked walking up behind him.

"If I'm going to set things strait I can't sit around here moping...I need to do something about it...starting with Kursed. I can't let her track down Slash by herself...she'll get herself killed. She has no idea what kind of person he is...and the Psychobitch he's traveling with may very well be worse than he is."

"You be careful..."

"Don't worry I'll come back remember...I still have to finish that water system for you..." Lament said climbing into his arwing, "...Bella there is something I need you to do. The gravestone in the well. The name faded off."

"I'll take care of it Lament..."

"Thanks Bella..."

The air hatch to the cockpit slid shut over Lament, Belladonna sat by and watched as the black ship tore off into the sky carrying Lament toward the Raven which still hung in orbit. His first mission was to find Kursed and hope that she was in a listening mood. As soon as Lament made it into the docking bay of his ship he rushed to the bridge almost leaping into his captain's seat...

"MEL...get me a sub-space link with Kursed's ship."

"Closer though advised as sub-space link will give away our current position." MEL's voice answered from the ship's PA speakers.

"That's exactly the point patch it through and get me a reading I want to know where that ship is..."

MEL remained silent for a moment, "Sub-space link established...ship location: Lylat Palms resort and space station...currently undergoing repairs."

**(Kursed's room...)**

**11:08am**

Kursed had actually began to enjoy herself. She'd been shopping for the first time in years, picked up a few things...nothing she really needed; few new articles of clothing, certain sweets that she liked, and a gold bracelet that she couldn't stop eyeing as she made her way through the endless shops around the place. She'd been to the spa at least three times already and was contemplating on whether or not to go back for another visit to the strong soft hands of the, obviously gay wolf masseuse. She remembered when Falco first explained the concept of homosexuality by pointing out a gay couple or two one day on Corneria before she'd became a full fledged member of Star Fox. She found the concept to be a bit odd...but all together figured that other people's love lives were absolutely none of her business...she also learned that there were lots of conflicting view on the subject all over the star systems that she'd been to; she found it to be completely idiotic for people to be so fixated on such a matter when there were wars and death everywhere...

She had just finished with breakfast as she had slept in late when her personal communicator sounded, "Hello.." The communicator she had was a lot like a cell phone no images.

She couldn't believe the voice that greeted her, "Kursed...don't hang up..."

"What the fuck do you want?" She demanded.

"Look...we need to talk..."

She was a bit confused, "About what?..."

"I'll just say you were right and leave it at that..."

"Well as much as I like hearing you admit your being a moron..."

"Listen...please..." Lament cut her off, Kursed was stunned, did Lament just beg her to listen to him? "...I can help you find Slash...I want to help you find him..."

"If this is a trick...I swear.."

Kursed sighed, "I'm sorry Lament...but I don't have a reason to trust you..."

"...god you stubborn bitch..." Lament said, "...then listen to this. You stay where you are...and...lying or not I'll sighn over registry of the Raven to you."

"The Raven...it's yours. All you have to do is stay there and listen to what I have to say when I arrive."

"You know if you're lying to me you're dead..."

"If that's what it comes down to I won't stop you.." Lament said turning off his communicator.

Kursed was stunned..._Did I really just have that conversation?..._She asked herself. She still couldn't believe what she'd just heard, was he really on his way to the station? His voice sounded so different, like he was sincere about the whole thing...but it was his last statement that caught her off guard. He'd always fought so hard for his life, why would he give it away so quickly now? She could only wait and guess what he may have been thinking. She had no other option, she called the front desk and ordered the room for one more night...

**(Sauria...two hours later)**

Belladonna had promised Lament that she'd take care of his love's grave. Her secret of being able to see while blind was something Cerinians had learned long ago; she simply used her Telepathy to control the mind of a local bird that rested on her shoulder when others weren't around and used the same Telepathy to look through it's eyes...in truth Mind Sight, as they called it was a very simple to master skill that even the most unskilled Cerinian learned at a young age..

After about an hour of arranging things and watering the flowers about the area she knelt in front of the gravestone...She concentrated the magic force of her Cerinian heritage into her palm and as it became enveloped in a deep blue light she placed her hand on the face of the stone slab...There was a hissing sound followed by a strange smell as the stone began to heat up at an incredible rate. After a minute of this her hand returned to normal which she withdrew allowing the spot to cool...Belladonna stood to examine her work, and with a satisfied nod headed out of the well. Where she'd placed her hand on the gravestone, set in still glowing hot letters was a single word...

_Krystal..._


	14. Lockdown

**Chapter 14**: Lockdown...

**Lylat Palms **

**May 9th **

**9:03am**

Lament was hardly able to believe that he was actually doing this. He stood in between two small ships; his own arwing, and a very familiar larger blue ship...she was still here. She'd called and left a message with his ship's computer...MEL...telling him that she could be found in room 373 or the Heavenly Arms Hotel. It wasn't a particularly far walk, only a mile or so. The station was mostly all metal, parts, here and there were made of shatter proof glass including the massive dome where the resort area was located...The resort was a separate part of the station; the inside of the dome was roughly twice the size of Corneria city, there was everything inside the dome, even a simulated beach. Lament wasn't really impressed with the place, he'd been here once or twice before, the place was actually so large that they used hover cars to get around the 'city under glass' as it was often called. The first thing that Lament did was hailed a cab...he wasn't about to walk...

The cab that stopped was driven by a rather pudgy squirrel, "Where to Mack?"

"Heavenly Arms..." Lament answered.

The cabbie turned to look at the fox, "Uhh...you want'n the strip joint on 3rd or the hotel on Emmerson.?"

Lament thought to himself then shook his head, "Hotel...maybe later with the other..."

The cab rushed off quickly..._Wow where the hell did this guy learn to drive?_...After being in the cab for only a matter of minutes the cab came to a stop at a massive building. A red carpet led from the sidewalk and continued through the glass revolving doors, Lament paid off the cabbie and headed inside; the insides of the hotel did impress him a bit though, the walls were the color of fine pearls, detailed banners hung from the walls, and there were many ferns and other small plants and trees that lined the lobby which combined into an intoxicating scent...

The green feathered female avian at the receptionist desk eyed the fox, "Can I help you sir?"

"Yes...I need room 373...business meeting."

"That would be 53rd floor..." She said tilting over the desk so that her breasts were partially visible pointing to the elevators, "...through those elevators, then on the 53rd it's a left, down the hall, and a right...first room on your left."

_Is this chick comin' on to me?_ He asked himself, "That was...uhh...detailed...thanks."

Lament made his way to the elevator and pressed the button for the 53rd floor; the ride was slow for the most part especially the dull but somehow equally soothing music that drained from a speaker above, it was like a tranquilizer...then again he hadn't slept for the entire trip almost 9 hours of flight and boredom. When the doors finally opened he nearly fell on his face, as he'd been leaning on the door. It was a short walk down the hall before he was standing nervously before a metal door, to the left of which was a small golden plate that displayed the room number 373. Lament pushed a small button on the palm reading pad...

"Please state name..." The device asked.

"Lament..."

There was a brief silence, "Access granted..."

With a beep the door hissed open allowing Lament to enter the room; it was a nice room, the queen sized bed was almost double the size of his bed, there was a small balcony behind a set of glass doors,there was a massive plasma television across from the large bed...but there was no one inside. He looked around for a moment before the bathroom door opened. Oddly enough nobody came out, Lament peeked inside...

"Kursed?"

Just to the edge of the door was as far as he was willing to look, then again had he looked in any further he'd have seen Kursed hiding beside the door against the wall. He sighed as he walked over and sat at the foot of her bed...

"Kursed...I know the last thing you want is to talk to me..." Lament said staring at the floor completely ignoring the fact that she'd stepped around the corner cautiously pulling her spear from a concealed place by the couch, "I came here for a reason...it was actually...to ask you something..."

"Then ask..." Kursed said making sure the point of her spear was between them, she was still cautious, the Lament she knew and hated would never act like this.

"I want...damn it..." Lament sighed deeply, "Look this is going to sound stupid but...what you said back on Titania, it forced me to realize something. That you were right. Truth is I didn't care...huh...about anything, even less about myself. To be honest I...always blamed myself for my lover's death. Somewhere among the years of drinking myself to death...I killed your mate..."

Kursed retracted her spear, "He wasn't my mate...there was a time I'd hoped he would be...but then he broke up with me...I guess you'd have called him a military man...got involved with the war. It's confusing really...after the war I wanted to go back...sure I hated him, but I still loved him. Then I got home and heard the news and...If I would have only come back when he asked me to it never would have happened. He wouldn't have run into you...and he'd still be here..." She was hardly wearing anything under the towel wrapped about her but, she didn't care as she sat on another side of the bed.

"At least you have what you need to carry on with your life..." Lament pointed out, "There's no doubt that he never blamed you for anything...so you never needed his forgiveness. You just for some reason feel at fault for his death...when all the fault in on me. The difference is that for me there's only one way to get that forgiveness...and I seriously doubt that you will ever find it in your heart to give it to me...but...if you can think of some way to earn it...I'll do anything you ask..." Kursed jerked away a bit as Lament reached across the bed and took her by the wrist forcing something into her hand...

With all of that out of the way Lament headed out of the room; what he'd handed to her was exactly what he'd promised her, the title to The Raven and everything on board it, and also a golden ring topped by a large sapphire cut in the shape of a heart. He stopped at the door, "You know Kursed...your boyfriend and I...we made the same mistake. We took the two of you for granted...and even though he's on the other side, we're both paying for it. I'll leave you be now...this is a nice place. I think I'll stay a few days before I head home. Bella might not be helpless but she's too old to get anything done on her own..."

Lament was a few steps out the door when Kursed stood up, "Wait! You want to be forgiven fine...help me find that bastard Slash..."

Lament froze, "This about your boyfriend?.."

"He spent his entire life defending everyone in this star system...if you want him to forgive you, then do what he would do..."

"What'd you have in mind?"

"Alone we aren't much of a match for those two...but..."

"Together we would have the upper hand...well...in theory."

"Well they took the sword from you...we should base the search on that..." Kursed said, "...I'm gonna head downstairs and check out, I'll be right back."

Kursed got dressed and headed to the lobby. Lament on the other hand was left alone, his eyes were sagging involuntarily, his head nodded to the side every few seconds, only to have him jerk himself upright. Having deprived himself of sleep he was in no position to win his lasting war with the Sandman. Before Kursed could get back she found the exhausted vulpine asleep...his lower body hanging off the bed snoring softly. She tried several times to wake him up, but he was as good a dead to the outside world. She even rolled him off the bed resulting in a powerful thud, but with little to no results. Kursed let out an annoyed sigh and headed for the phone where she called the front desk...

"This is room 373...go ahead and cancel that check out...I won't be going anywhere today...hmm...payment?"

Kursed developed a devious grin as she walked over and picked Lament's pocket searching through his wallet, "Yes I've got that covered..." She said pulling out a thick wad of cash and hanging up the phone, "...and then some."

**(000)**

Lament woke with a slight headache and rubbed the sleep from his eyes...it was early morning...very early, the clock on the room's night stand read 3:35am. There was a light snore coming from a small mass of covers on a nearby leather couch...he almost didn't hear the sound, it was almost silent. He sort of chuckled to himself when he saw Kursed half hanging off the couch, her mouth hanging open. He'd never thought she could look so...cute. His headache eventually led him to the bathroom where he decided against a shower, but he hadn't seen a hot tub in years. Lament was happy to get into the tub having only his suit of clothes in the hotel he was forced to lay all of his clothes to the side...

Kursed was forced to wake as she rolled off the couch hitting her head on a nearby coffee table...as she sat up she wiped a small string of drool from the corner of her mouth. Now her head hurt, but she could ignore that, she had a decent ship now...and at least one crew member, who she knew was a relatively fair mechanic. She stumbled to the bathroom door only to find it was locked and Lament was missing from the bed. She ignored the fact that it was so early in the morn and decided to finally get her things together so that they could leave early and get a good start on tracking down Slash and Fyra. She was about to tell Lament to get his ass moving before the television turned itself on; it's screen displayed the letters EBS (emergency broadcast station), her heart leapt into her throat when she saw Lament and her photos on the screen. Above their photos were the words Armed and Dangerous, below their photos were the prices on their heads both set at 1,500,000 credits each then the voice sounded...

"_We apologize for the interruption of your time...but at _6:23 _this evening these two criminals were spotted somewhere within the Lylat Palms resort. Their names are Lament and Kursed...Kursed is wanted for the assassination of Senator Darius Fin if found she will most likely be in the presence of Lament, the most wanted person in the Lylat system for the murder of Fox McCloud. They are both known to be armed and incredibly dangerous...You are cautioned not to approach either at any time, if you see them call the police immediately...at this time the entire resort is in a state of lock down until further notice..."_

"Hell no!" Kursed exclaimed to herself running to the bathroom door, "Lament! LAMENT!! Get your ass out here we gotta go now!"

This was important enough to call for desperate measures when he didn't answer, she used her access codes for the room to override the door's locks and rushed inside to find that Lament was not inside. His clothes were on the counter but he was nowhere in sight and Kursed could distinctly smell wet fur. She was beginning to think that he'd left her again but then she heard the sound of someone moving in the air vents above her. After a few moments she heard his voice come from a missing vent panel by the toilet...

"Psst...Kursed...get your things and pass me my clothes..." Lament's voice said from the shadows inside the tight space, "They're searching room by room for us...hurry."

She passed his clothes into the opening, she didn't even bother with anything other than her new jewelry, before she climbed into the vent as well. The first thing she noticed was how dark it was inside the claustrophobic space, she couldn't see anything accept for the small beams of light that made their way through the many ducts of the different rooms in the hotel. She could hear Lament start to move forward and followed behind as closely as possible without touching the fox in front of her. It was as they passed one of the other vents leading to the ducts that the light gave Kursed a view of the still nude fox crawling on all fours in front of her, she instantly jerked her eyes away...

"What the hell is wrong with you put on some clothes?" She tried her hardest not to yell.

"Well excuse me but, this isn't the ideal size of a changing booth and I was acting on a bit of an impulse..." Lament replied, "...I'll agree that the view back there may not be a welcome one but still. I'd rather not discuss this moment in prison...You know those bastards have a nice little cell for each of us on Nexus Prime. Not the nicest place in the galaxy you know?"

The thought of the 'prison planet' as it was called made Kursed's skin crawl. The worst offenders in the galaxy were not sentenced to death...rather they were given a much more horrid fate...a jungle planet with no inhabitants short of the inmates that are dropped off there to suffer for their crimes by living side by side with the only other creatures like them; it was a place where no one could be trusted and even fewer survived. Most of the animals of the planet were savage, bloodthirsty, predators it was nothing short of hell itself for those that were forced to live there. She decided to pass off his state of affairs as a minor annoyance compared to what he'd just mentioned. Kursed followed Lament down the endless shafts but after a long while of trailing behind him Lament stopped suddenly causing Kursed to ram into him, her face rammed the cheek of his butt...

After a moment she punched the same cheek, "Why did you stop?" She almost yelled at him.

"Ow...damn it..." Lament hissed as his backside let him know he'd been hit, "...they've got the exit to this place guarded."

"Is there another exit?"

"Yeah...but it's not pretty."

Kursed stalled for a moment, "Well lets go." She said tugging on his tail.

Lament sighed deeply, "You're the boss...but don't say I didn't warn you."

Kursed didn't know how long they'd been crawling through the dusty vents...but she did know they'd descended a number of floors. As they rounded a corner Kursed froze...

"My god what the hell is that smell?" She asked trying to wave a smell from her face.

Lament froze for a moment and chuckled, "Heh..heh...sorry bout that."

"Jesus Christ Lament, a little warning would've been nice."

"Sorry...but I'm hungry...that happens when I'm hungry."

As they continued their trip through the vents; she wasn't really angry anymore, she found the situation to be a bit humorous actually. Soon however Lament came to a stop again but this time he removed a panel from beneath him. "Stay here I'll scout the area for any police or guards." He said dropping into the room, where he quickly started to put on his clothes. He then looked up to see Kursed sticking her head through the opened vent cover, she dropped him a small blaster and pointed to the far side of the room where her Telepathy had obviously picked up on someone's thoughts. Lament then rushed off toward the direction she'd pointed out, Kursed had no idea what kind of room they were in...it looked like a boiler room but, the large room was rather cold and had no furnaces, just a mass of pipes and large tanks...

Lament inched his way passed the tanks one by one toward the direction that Kursed had pointed out, he didn't travel far before he actually heard someone walking near a large network of pipes. He peeked around a corner to find that the noise was caused by a mechanic and a cop...

"So there are no escape routes?" The echidna in the police uniform asked.

"Yes sir..." The raccoon mechanic replied, "...only way out of here is the old catacombs."

"What are the catacombs?"

"Not catacombs really..." The raccoon replied, "...it was actually an old escape tunnel when this was just a rundown space port. Then back in 3021 someone decided to turn it into a resort and went all out in the preparations, renovating, refurbishing, rebuilding...anything that wasn't rebuilt was torn down. They missed the entrance to the catacombs when they built this place over the sight of an old warehouse, most people are afraid to go down there..."

"Where dose it come out..."

"McCloud Memorial Park...on the north side of the pond."

The cop turned on his radio, "Rose...get dispatch on the line and tell them to get a few men over to the pond in McCloud Memorial...they may be headed there...Then I'm headed for the roof of the hotel to check there."

**(000)**

Soon enough the two left the area and Lament returned to the vent for Kursed. She dropped from the vent and followed Lament through the now empty room, they stopped by a mess of old pipes that were stacked on the ground. The pipes were huge, the massive pipes used for the water mains that ran through the floor; they were roughly 10 feet long and several inches thick, they were heavy. They were forced to move them one by one, unfortunately after so many had been moved the stack crumbled filling the room with the loud metal on metal sound of the pipes hitting the ground and each other. They paused for a moment and let the sound fade away...suddenly someone burst through a nearby door only to find an empty room and a mess of pipes all over the floor. He pulled his gun and flashlight and began to search the area as the room was rather dark. Lament and Kursed were both well hidden, Kursed found a small place beneath one of the large tanks whereas Lament was following the cop from the pipes high overhead...soon enough the officer made his way around back to where Kursed was hiding. Unfortunately as he passed the tank she hid under he suddenly stopped, his lupine sense of smell began to attract him to something. He shone his light under the tank and bent down slowly until he saw her face..

"Alright you, come out." He said pointing his weapon at her.

Kursed exited her safe haven with her paws in the air, she was certain that Lament would find a way out and leave her to rot in prison...

"Now where's Lament?" He demanded.

"I don't know...we split up."

As she said this the officer looked around still keeping the vixen in his line of sight but, as he turned to face her again Lament dropped from the pipes with his fists locked together. As he landed behind the wolf he drove his hammer-like fists into the wolf's neck knocking him to the pavement, he started to push himself off the ground but Lament's bare foot struck the side of his face laying him unconscious. Kursed had an odd look on her face, she was surprised that he hadn't used her as a distraction to get his own way out, but he didn't in fact it was possible that he'd just saved her from a rather horrible fate..

"Nice distraction lets go..." Lament said patting her on the shoulder as he walked by, "...get his gun, and that light. It could get pretty fucking dark down there..."

Lament walked back to the cop and handcuffed him to a nearby tank, then smashed his radio, "Can't have him waking up and informing anyone where we went."

The door to their exit was covered by the pipes, Lament was informed of the exit and had used it once before when he had a job long ago on the station. As for Kursed she was about to learn why their way out wasn't such a nice thing. Lament pulled her toward the small double door and used his blaster on the small lock and chain, as soon as the door was thrown open Kursed pulled her head away; there was a rancid smell far worse than anything that she'd ever smelled, it instantly caused her eyes to water and sent her into a fit of coughing...

"Lament...what the hell? Again?"

"Give it a rest..." Lament said walking over to her, "...it's an old swage line. Like I said it ain't pretty."

"It's repulsive...it's like rotten ass."

"Correction..." Lament interrupted, "...it IS rotten ass...well...in a manner of speaking. Well ladies first."

Kursed donned a disgusted look, "That is soooo gentlemanly of you...ugh..." She said before jumping into the pitch black hole, "Oh my god...tell me I'm not standing ankle deep in crap."

There was a slight splash behind her before Lament's paw touched her shoulder, "Okay then I won't say it...but look on the bright side."

"And what might that be?"

"I'm not wearing any boots..." Lament said, "...look just give me the light and follow me. They most likely won't follow us down here."

"I'll try to contain my amazement."

Kursed followed Lament through the muck below their feet, the smell actually made her light headed, she wondered how Lament was able to stand it. He didn't seem to be bothered by the smell at all, then again he'd been through some situations in his life that were most likely worse than walking thru refuse. He was amazingly quiet for the time they were walking, almost as if he was deep in thought about something. Kursed attempted to examine their surroundings but accept for the small light coming from the flashlight in Lament's paw, nothing else was visible. After so much time Kursed delved into her own thoughts. She was confused...but maybe Lament really had changed, but that didn't stop her from thinking how she was traveling with Fox's killer. How would he feel knowing that she was actually working with Lament? As she thought to herself she noticed that Lament had come to a stop and was looking for something. It wasn't long before she noticed he was climbing a small access ladder that was invisible to Kursed...after a few seconds his light went off and another light shone in from above him. She was more than happy to know that she'd be outside again soon...A few more seconds later Lament climbed back down...

"There's two cops up there. Patrolling the area." Lament said, "I'll go up and distract them...you meet me in the hanger." He said passing her the light, "Look if they catch me...just do me a favor and don't leave my Arwing in the hanger, take it with you. If worse comes to worse head to Sauria and wait in orbit for one week, if I don't show up after that...just leave me to whatever fate hands me..it's less than what I deserve."

"Why are you doing this?"

"I guess...redemption...for all the things I've done. The word Lament means 'sorrow'...but it never did bring me any, rather it was a cure. The only cure, when my entire life was torn away from me. So listen in case this is the only other chance I get...I'm sorry, for everything I've done to ruin your life."

Lament quickly made his way out of the hole and Kursed was able to hear the guards, "There he is get him!!"

"He really has changed..." Kursed whispered to herself as she crawled out into the light.

In the distance she could see Lament rushing the cops away from the hangers, she rushed off in the opposite direction. Kursed stuck to the shadows of the alleyways on her treck back to her ship, she wasn't far from the hanger when a mass of officers passed by most likely to head Lament off. When she reached the hanger she found that the ships were no longer guarded, she hurried and hid near Lament's arwing, but after an hour passed she decided that he must have been captured. She boarded his arwing and maneuvered it into the docking bay of her ship. Luckily enough the lockdown became pretty much useless after Lament was spotted since the guards that were set to the hanger had all been called in to help chase the nimble criminal down. Kursed set her course quickly to get out of the station, and headed to the Raven where she would dock and set a course for Sauria where she had promised to meet Lament.

Even after docking with her new mother ship, Kursed rushed to her room on her old ship and quickly turned on her t.v...The image instantly washed over to an overhead view of the park in the resort. A small, single figure was being pinned to the ground by a swarm of police officers...

"There you have it folks...Lament has been captured. He'll be transported to Corneria where he'll stand trial for his crimes...The whereabouts of Kursed are as of yet still unknown...but this photo of an unauthorized ship leaving the resort during lockdown..." The newscaster said as a picture of Kursed's ship was displayed, "...if seen report the sighting immediately to the Cornerian Defense Agency. And now we return you to our scheduled program."

His fate was indefinite, if he wasn't killed, he'd be sent to Nexus Prime...Kursed didn't quite know how to feel; on one hand she was rid of him and even if he wasn't killed by the Council, a life on Nexus most certainly would...on the other hand, he put himself in this position to get her out of the situation they were in in the first place. All she could do at the moment is honor his request and wait for some sort of sign of him to show up on the Raven's scanners.

**(Chapter 14 done...15 coming up titled 'Crossing the Line'...Remember to R&R people...THX for the support. ;-D )**


	15. Crossing the line

**Chapter 15**: Crossing the line...

**(The next morning, Sauria's orbit)**

Kursed refused to sleep in any of the Raven's many rooms,the ship reminded her too much of the others. Not just Fox but, all of her friends; the shy little guineas Slippy, that brash cocky bird Falco, or Katt, who seemed to try to hide her feelings even more than Falco did. As she made her rounds about the ship she began to doubt that it was in fact the Great Fox...too many things looked different...but that still didn't help the thoughts to go away. Most of the time she simply stayed aboard her small ship in the hanger, she went to the kitchen for some coffee and something to eat, only to find that her food supplies were dry. While she was in the hanger she'd obviously been robbed...there were a lot of hungry people out there. Because of her food shortage she was forced to exit her ship and walk to the Raven's kitchen...the halls of the old ship seemed to bring back relatively every memory she'd tried over the years to forget. The kitchen as she found had been stocked with food. Kursed figured she'd eventually have to get used to her new ship...after eating and having a hot cup of coffee she headed into the bridge, another familiar looking room...

"Good morning captain..." MEL's voice called out over the PA system.

"G-good morning..."

"I am MEL...the previous captain filled in all of your signatures before disembarking, but a palm scan is still required. The scanning device should be located near the door to the bridge."

Kursed had been through this before, she approached the door which slid open at her presence and placed her tight palm on the green pad near the door. Her palm began to warm up a bit as a small wave of light washed over her palm again and again, finally stopping...

"Palm scan complete...now overriding all other signatures...Error...captains quarter's on strict lockdown protocol, password access required for override."

She didn't care, she just walked off to inspect the rooms of the ship...they were not what she'd expected; they were mostly packed full of boxes of 'god only knows what'...all the rooms where like this but one that she could get into, it was located down the hall of the captain's quarters. She slowly entered the room; it was perfectly taken care of, but relatively bare, only a bed and a night stand. On top of the night stand sat what was once a lovely silver picture frame, the glass was shattered and the frame was twisted and contorted, the picture it once held was gone. She didn't remember any of this, so she was sure that this wasn't the Great Fox, but a tear fell from her eye as she felt the ambiance of past tension in the room. She decided that it would do and headed to her ship in the docking bay to move her things to the room, she entered the docking bay and looked around, she wouldn't run out of spare parts there was another arwing. She walked up to her blue ship and punched in the access code which caused the bay door before her to slide upward...

When she looked away from her feet and into the ship her gaze was met by that of a stranger and before she could realize that it was Lament she kicked forward into the split of his legs. Lament let out a horrible scream and crumbled to his knees, "My god!! What the fuck!!" He managed to scream above the pain.

"Lament? What the fuck? I just watched you get arrested..."

Lament just rolled onto his side cradling the injury...

"Come on...I've been kicked there too." Kursed said, "Sure it hurts like hell but still...you're overdoing this a bit."

"Yeah...well...your junk isn't dangling on the outside for everyone to cram into your pelvis."

Kursed considered this for a moment, "Well I'm sorry...I wasn't expecting you. Where were you?"

"Hiding in my arwing's cargo bay..."

"Then why didn't you come out sooner?"

Lament managed to stand up but the pain in his crotch forced him to vomit, "..._urk_...to be honest..._urk_...I fell asleep."

**(000)**

It was nearly an hour before Lament found himself free of the agony that Kursed had caused him. They went to the kitchen for lunch, where their talk continued after Lament made something to eat...

"So if that wasn't you being arrested who was it?"

Lament laughed as he walked to the table she sat at and slid her a plate with two sandwiches, and sat down with one of his own, "A very happy, moderately wealthy bum...with a very convincing hologram over his body."

Kursed chuckled to herself quietly and ripped one of the sandwiches in half, steaming golden cheese connected the two halves, "Grilled cheese...I haven't eaten this in years."

"You kidding?...I eat this all the time...one of my favorites."

"So where do you suppose we'll start looking for that Slash character?"

"Beats me...you know anyone that's good at tracking?"

Lament bit his lip to keep from laughing at a rather long string of melted cheese dangling from her lip, the look on his face gave him away..

"What?" Kursed asked.

"No-nothing...but you may want to wipe that cheese off your face."

Kursed rolled her eyes and wiped the cheese from her face, "Well...Xander could pretty much find anyone, but I have no idea where he and Arlex are."

Lament paused as he was about to bite into one of his own sandwiches, "MEL...look up anything you can find on Xander Cramm...especially recent purchases of a ship."

"Limit the search to Katinan archives...that's where they bought their new ship."

MEL's voice responded about a minute later, "Scanning Katinan archives...process length...approximately 6 hours."

**(000)**

After about another three hours of simply waiting around and doing nothing Kursed began to wonder what Lament was up to...she hadn't seen her supposed crew member in some time. She called him once of twice over the PA system but, received no reply...

"MEL...locate Lament."

"Lament is in the hall of the second deck preforming routine maintenance."

"Well at least he can find something to keep himself busy with."

Kursed was board out of her mind, three hours of doing absolutely nothing...she hadn't gone so long without something to do, in over two years. Now that she thought about it...chasing Lament down was all she ever really had to do anymore, now that she was only several meters from him at all times...there was really nothing left to keep her life interesting. "Well...maybe he needs some help or something...I can't stand sitting here anymore." She said to herself standing and heading off the bridge.

It took little time to get to elevator that would take her to the second deck, the halls here were just as empty as all the others accept for the fact that it was unbearably dark here. She walked down the halls blindly, bumping into walls and nearly tripping over unseen objects. Heading toward a light far down the halls. After a time she found her way to the light that was coming from a missing panel in the floor...

"Lament? You down there?"

"Yeah..." Lament's voice echoed from beneath her.

"What happened down here why's it so dark?" Kursed asked kneeling down by the hole.

Lament's head popped out of the hole, he holding a small florescent lamp, "I had to shut off the power down here to replace some faulty wiring." He said pulling himself out of the hole and sitting on the edge.

Once again she saw the scar near his naval as he was not wearing a shirt, "Where did you get that?" Kursed asked pointing at the scar.

Lament ran a finger along it, "A memento from an old friend. I was supposed to bring him in, I'll just say he'd pissed off the wrong people...we got into it. It started as a fist fight, but when I started to win...he stabbed me...I woke up a week later in the hospital."

"Wow...that sucks."

"It's still nothing compared to the one you gave me when we first met...you drove your spear right through my thigh..."

"Well to be honest you got lucky..." Kursed said with a smile, "...I wasn't aiming for your thigh when I threw it."

"You know you don't have to go through this act all the time?"

"What act?"

"Come on...every time I turn around I can feel it..." Lament said, "...you searching for a good knife spot. I understand why you feel the way you do...but all I can do is apologize. If I could bring him back I would, but I can't. If my death means that much to you, then when this is over you can have it...I'm done fighting you...and I'm tired of running."

"You don't get it do you..?" Kursed said, "...I don't have any right to kill you, I never did. Everything was my fault...I should have went with my gut and never told him how I felt, at least then I'd have been the only one hurt."

"Hey...listen...If you keep looking to the past, you'll never see what lies ahead. You can't keep dwelling on past mistakes." Lament said, "I mean look at me...by all rights I should have been killed hundreds of times by now...but for some reason; fate, or destiny, or god...whatever you want to call it, decided that I should live. Why is still pretty damn unclear to me...my purpose now it to find out why? If I still have a purpose in life...what is it?"

"I think we have the same problem..." Kursed said, "...we devoted our lives to someone else, when that person was taken out of our lives we just didn't know how to react. You sunk into depression and alcohol, me...I decided to take everything out on the one person that may or may not have done me any wrong."

"Kid..." Lament laughed, "...just about everyone in this star system has a right to kill me." He said standing and walking down the hall, "MEL...return power to this area." He said, "Look I'm heading to the surface to visit Bella, if you feel like it you can come along. An extra set of hand would probably be a help with those repairs I promised to do on her place."

**(000)**

Though she was a bit embarrassed by their recent show of emotion Kursed just realized that Lament had just offered her a solution to her previous problem. The lights in the empty hall kicked on, and Kursed rushed out of the hall and quickly made her way to the docking bay, where Lament was going over some checks on his arwing before departure, he stopped and removed the black tank top that hung over his shoulder and wiped down the nose of his ship...

"She really means a lot to you doesn't she?" Kursed asked walking over to her own arwing.

"Huh...yeah this ship's saved my ass a number of times." Lament said patting the arwing's hull before putting his shirt on.

"Not the ship you idiot..." Kursed half laughed, "...Bella."

Lament began to run his fingers along the wing of the black fighter, "She's sort of an adopted family...so yes, she means very much to me...I care for her the way I would my own mother."

"When did you meet her?"

Lament rubbed the back of his neck, " About three...four years back. I was doing some work on Korona...that's a planet in the Stygian system...Korona, it's not a good place for a lone woman of any age...especially a blind one. She seemed to get along pretty well and all but, I gave her an offer to take her to a much nicer place. So I brought her to Sauria."

"Why?"

"I don't know...I just felt like she should be here...Dravyn always told me how much Sauria reminded him of Cerinia."

"Who's Dravyn?"

Lament approached her and removed a photo from his wallet and handed it to Kursed, "He was a Cerinian that I met in the war...he somehow got mixed into everything...never could get him to tell me how...he died on a ground mission, he and I both fell in league with the Katinan military, he and I were the only two that lived through the ambush our squad was hit by...but he was...shot two or three times carrying me out of the area, I was pretty badly hurt too. When I woke up I was laying across his lap, Dravyn's back was against a wall and his rifle was laying on my chest...he was still trying to protect me when he died...best friend I ever had."

As Kursed listened she looked at the photo; Lament was dressed in battle fatigues and still had his one eye, his arm was draped over the shoulders of a blue furred fox that stood next to him with and arm slung over Lament's shoulder. The Cerinian was of even a more impressive build that Lament's, he was shorter but very broad in his musculature.

"You two looked close."

"Well...in those kind of situations you want all the friends you can get. He told me that a number of his people got off of Cerinia before she blew, and some parents sent their children away. Either way you aren't alone out there. If you count him, yourself, and Bella, I've known four Cerinians myself."

"Who was the fourth?" Kursed asked handing him back his photo.

"I'd rather not talk about it..." He said boarding his arwing, "...besides that we've chatted enough. Let's go see how Bella's doing."

**(000)**

Their trip took no time at all before they landed on the beach...Lament was the first to leave his arwing only to notice smoke raising from Bella's place and flames dancing about the building. Lament was in shock, he couldn't move until Kursed moved up beside him, "Hey what's..." She cut herself off as she noticed what he was staring at.

Before Kursed could even realize that anything had happened Lament was sprinting toward Bella's house, the place had been recently set ablaze. Kursed finally caught up to Lament but found it odd that he wasn't more upset..

"Hurry up!! Bella could be in there!!" Kursed said rushing toward the building only to be caught by Lament who held her in place.

"She's not here...Look..." Lament said pointing to the sand.

There were three sets of footprints scattered about, a nearby tree had been sliced through, and there were several marks where someone had slid or was dragged through the sand...

"She fought them off for a while...but they carried her off...I bet it was hell for them to realize that she was Telekinetic..." Lament continued examining the tracks in the sand, turning and following as if he were somehow able to tell what had happened, "Okay here's what I think happened. It all started at the front door, Bella obviously sensed that something was wrong and blew the first guy away from the hut..."

"How can you tell that?" Kursed asked.

"Well for one thing...the door it way in the fuck over there..." Lament said pointing to the door which was laying a good two hundred yards away, "...there were only two of them so I'm suspecting that this might have been Slash and his psychotic little love muffin. The most of the fight was just the two of them trying to get close enough to her to knock her out..." Lament moved to the spots where someone had slid across the sand, "...they landed here, here, here...here, against this rock, this tree...which was promptly cut down for some reason, here, and finally here." He continued stopping by where Kursed was standing. Bella exerted too much power tossing them away from herself and finally collapsed...that's what made this impression by the door...then they just drug her off."

It was as Lament followed the tracks left from the two dragging the old vixen that he noticed the glint of something shiny in the sand. Lament knelt down and removed a very small disc from the sand, Bella had obviously left it for Lament to find. Kursed joined Lament who was studying the ULD (universal laser disc). If he knew Bella half as well as he thought he did, she'd left vital information on it. Lament slid the small disk into his wrist communicator...it was an audio disc...

Bella's voice came from the communicator.

_Lament...if you're listening to this then I'm either dead...or missing, either way please don't blame yourself. If the two you were searching for really are intent on using the sword then they are headed to a planet in the Dan'jas system called Uth'maria. It was the chosen home of the humans that left Cerinia, that is where the other alter is...You cannot allow them to open the gate, otherwise the entire galaxy could be in peril..._

Lament sighed as he ejected the disc and tossed it to the ground, "You don't need to risk yourself with this...it's my fight." He said heading to his arwing.

"I don't think so...you aren't the only one who has a hand in all of this you know?" Kursed said climbing into her own arwing, "Besides...it'll be a lot easier fighting two of them with two of us...and besides that you are a part of MY crew now...as your captain you have no choice but to follow orders."

Lament laughed at the persistence she showed, "Fine...fine. Then what do you say we just get this over with...so I can finally kill this bastard...and that crazy bitch of his gets on my nerves."

"Is that because she's crazy..." Kursed started as the airlock above her head slid shut, "...or because she kicked your ass?" She finished after turning on her ships com system.

She expected some sort of reply but...Lament only faked a slight smile, he was not handling the situation so well. Yet there was nothing to be done for it...she'd spent the better part of four years trying to kill him, she wasn't sure why but she felt that she should do something to take his mind off of the situation. The flight back to the Raven seemed eerily quiet...as she thought to herself while sitting in the cockpit of her docked arwing she came tor realized that Lament had become her friend somehow...and like any other friend she didn't want to see him in pain. It wasn't too long before she thought of something.

While Kursed was thinking to herself Lament plopped himself into the captain's seat on the bridge...

"MEL...how far are we from a planet called Uth'maria in the Dan'jas system?"

"Approximately 230,000 astronomical units..."

"What kind of trip time?"

"Approximately 49 days..."

"I was afraid of that...set a course for Papetoon we'll need supplies."

"Affirmative...processing with CHSA..." MEL's voice replied.

"Yo Kursed..." Lament shouted to the PA system, "...this is gonna be a hell of a trip...three days to Papetoon...then 49 more to get to Uth'maria."

"Well...if we can survive that long together without trying to kill each other we should be fine."

Lament looked to one of the screens before him and noticed the time 11 pm...he just wanted to forget all about all of this...and he knew just how to do that; a bath, and sleep...

**(AN: I think this whole Lament thing may pan out to be two...maybe three fics long...I really like how it's turned out so far. Stay tuned for Chapter 16 One last apology...)**


	16. The Journey pt1

**Chapter 16****:** The Journey pt1...

**(Papetoon...)**

**May 16th **

**11:22am**

When they landed Lament gave Kursed a small list and took another himself of things that they'd need. Kursed found it odd that she was off gathering food and stuff...she felt more like a house wife than a captain. By the time she was finished and checking out of the store it was already nearly noon. She put in an order to have all the stuff delivered to the Raven, she was a bit relieved to be back to the ship when she got there. Lament was looking over several large stacks of supplies, lifting the tarp that covered each and then checking them off on a small list on a clipboard he carried. He didn't acknowledge Kursed's presence at all, rather he just kept to his business until he was finally done...

"Well...that's everything we need for the ships; fuel cells, hydraulic fluids, coolant, wiring for this thing's shity com system, plasma cells for the weapon systems, ammo for our blasters, and some other things I thought we could use."

"Well the food and stuff should be here soon." Kursed assured him.

"Good...MEL already got us clearance for the jump to Uth'maria. So all we need to do now is get all of this crap onto the ship."

The two worked for about an hour moving the supplies to the ship before the rest of the supplies arrived, the entire process of loading the Raven down with the supplies took about three hours. After they were done loading the Raven they boarded the ship and set about their routine. The Raven was on it's way within the hour, speeding toward their destination...but even hyperspace was far too slow for Lament.

**(000)**

The days all seemed to last forever, by the time a week had passed by Lament was stressed out of his mind. He woke one morning and rolled over to examine his clock; 2o'clock...he gave up on trying to sleep. There was nothing to do, he couldn't sleep, he'd taken two naps yesterday just to blow off time, it was probably why he couldn't sleep. He made his way to the docking bay where he decided to work on his arwing...but that didn't last long as there was only so much he could do to the ship; he replaced all the fuel cells, adjusted the output calibration to the G-diffuser, adjusted the feed to the weapons system, and gave it a full diagnostic check up. When he was finished he left the cockpit open and turned on his music, a sort of light rock music, and sat on the wing of the small fighter leaning against the hull of the ship...it was the most relaxed he'd been in years, but he still couldn't sleep. He just closed his eyes and listened to the music, soon the silence was interrupted by the sound of the docking bay's heavy automatic door as it hissed open, he didn't need to look to know it was Kursed...she was the only other person on the ship...

He was forced to open his eyes when the sound of her footsteps stop, when he did he found that she was standing over him wearing a devious smile. She quickly lowered herself sitting on his outstretched legs, she ran her paws across the fur on his face then pulled him toward her forcing him into a passionate kiss, it felt like she was trying to pull his face off, he didn't understand at first but who cared, he gave up and kissed her back wrapping his arms around her. He expected her to rip a hole in him when his paws clutched her ass, but to his surprise she simply strengthened her hold on him, using her tongue to probe every inch of his mouth, as her hand began to familiarize themselves with the details of his body. She broke their embrace releasing a loud moan of passion as Lament's paws worked their way to her breasts beneath her shirt. He was curious as to what brought this out in her but he didn't really care...his claws ripped the shirt from her body, she threw her head back letting out a louder moan of pleasure as Lament's tongue began to work over her firm ample breasts. He stopped for a moment when he felt her warm hand creep past the waistline of his pants where they began to rub his growing arousal. She finally pushed Lament back pulling away her jeans after releasing him from his own pants. He could hardly believe what was happening here, he hadn't been with a woman in years he never expected her to be the one to break the cycle. He held his hands on her hip as she positioned herself over him...she screamed with pleasure as she guided him into her, their tails coiled together as she began raise and lower herself onto him, her cries of extacy growing by the moment. Lament tried to hold himself off but he couldn't help it. Soon Kursed let out a shriek as her orgasm clenched Lament's manhood tight causing him to release everything he was holding back, the brutal sensation causing him to throw his head back closing his eyes...

The shock of his own orgasm pulled him out of his sleep; his heart was pounding, his breathing was rapid, and he was sweating like crazy. He didn't even realize he'd fallen asleep, it all felt so real...too real as he realized there was a wet feeling in his pants. He jumped from the wing he'd fallen asleep on...

"Cold shower..." He shuddered to himself as he began to walk back through the halls to his room.

**(Meanwhile in Kursed's room)**

Kursed woke in a shocked state, her dreams had never been like that before. She was in a sweat, her head and heart were both pounding, and she was breathing heavily. It all felt so real; she hadn't dreamt of anyone before. Lament had entered her room in her dreams, and made love to her, she didn't care what it meant...she felt dirty, she knew it was only a dream but she didn't even try to fight it. She could only crawl out of bed and head to the shower...

**(000)**

After about a thirty minute shower Lament was freezing, the images however weren't so easy to get rid of. He got dressed quickly; just a black muscle shirt and a pair of long black jean shorts, and headed out of his room. As he walked toward the main hall that led toward the docking bay and the bridge...as he did Kursed walked out of her room and headed toward the same hall wearing blue jeans and a white t-shirt...though they were headed right at each other their eyes never left the floor. As they met at the intersection of halls one turned toward the bridge the other toward the docking bay...

"Hey..." They managed to say in unison as they passed each other.

Lament went to the one place he'd be able to get his mind back on track, the kitchen...he was hungry after all he had gotten little sleep last night, and though his dream was far from unpleasant, it still made him feel a bit shameful. He hadn't had a wet dream since he was in high school, but even then he though it all just felt wrong. He didn't want Kursed to know about the dream but he felt like he had to apologize for some reason. As for the moment he sat down at one of the tables slowly eating the small breakfast he'd made himself, it took forever sitting there picking at his food while having cup after cup of hot coffee, but at some point he managed to block out the images of himself and her locked in the throws of passion. It was noon before he finally came out of the kitchen, unfortunately Kursed had been feeling hungry and as he exited the kitchen the two ran into each other ramming the sides of their heads together as they were both looking in other directions when they came to the door. Lament stumbled back a bit but, thanks to his greater mass only Kursed fell down...

"Sorry about that..." Lament said helping her to her feet, "...you alright?"

"Yeah..." Kursed replied rubbing her sore temple, "...should've been watching where I was going."

Neither one of them looked up long enough to realize that they couldn't look at each other, not in the eyes at least...

"Hey there's something...I sort of need to talk to you about..." Lament said still looking at the floor.

"Can it wait? I'm kind of hungry and there's a lot of maintenance to work with on this ship. The engines developed some sort of problem last night."

"Right I guess we can talk about it tonight then...I'll go see what I can do about the engines."

The day progressed at it's normal pace, but when Lament finally tried to sit down and talk with Kursed she avoided him. He was forced to go to his room as she had already gone to sleep before him, he thought they had gotten past all of this, thought she'd finally forgiven him for what he'd done to her mate. He decided that he'd just wait until morning and approach her then...but it didn't work out. Day after day went by and she still avoided him. After a week of this he couldn't take it anymore...he'd gotten used to having someone to talk to again, and all the stress was getting to him now...if she wouldn't talk to him then he'd force her hand. He walked to the bridge where she was and approached her but as soon as he started talking she got up and left but that wasn't going to fly. He followed her to her room but she locked the door...

"Kursed...I really need to talk to you."

"Please go away." She half shouted.

"Look if we're working together like this we can't go back to not trusting each other again..."

There was no reply...

"Look something's really bothering you and I'm not leaving until I know what it is..."

Still no reply...

"Kursed you are really working on my last nerve here...so I'll tell you what." Lament said getting a bit annoyed, "I'm going to count to five...then if the door isn't open so we can sort out this issue I'll override the access code and come in on my own. I'd rather not do that."

He waited for a reply but one never came, "One...two...three...you may think I'm fuck'n with you but I'm not...four..."

"Okay...MEL unlock the door...I swear my ship but you're still the captain."

Lament entered the room to find that Kursed was standing by her window watching the rainbow colored spectrum of light that was hyperspace...

Lament walked over and joined her, "Okay now what's wrong?" He asked laying a paw on her shoulder.

She jerked away at his touch, "Don't touch me." She withdrew crossing her arms over her chest and looking away from him, "Just say what you wanted to say and get out."

"What the hell is wrong with you...I thought we put all this crap aside." Lament said, "I'm not used to having partners or friends but still...I do enjoy having someone to talk to."

"It's a personal problem okay?" Kursed answered sitting on her bed.

"Oh...look I don't mean to intrude or anything but..."

"It's okay..."

"You know talking to Bella always helped when I had a problem...I'd like to try helping with yours."

Kursed managed to look at his face, he was being serious, "You are the problem...look I'd really rather not talk about this okay, can we just forget about it?"

"As long as you can stop trying to avoid me at every turn."

"Alright...I'll stop, it was getting pretty hard to do some of those repairs yesterday by myself."

Lament walked to the door, "Wait didn't you want to tell me something?"

"Oh right I was so caught up in your problem I'd forgotten about mine..." Lament's head sank against his chest, "...I...had a dream about you last night."

_Is that all?_ Kursed asked herself, "And?"

"It was a dream that I'm not too proud of..."

"W-w-w-what?" She asked half laughing, she didn't really believe him.

"I'm sorry..."

This time she really did laugh, "Lament you idiot...it's a dream, you don't have to apologize to me because of a dream...it was a dream, I've had plenty of them myself." It was easier to forget about her own dream knowing that he'd had the same kind of dream, it still disturbed her a bit though, "Look just forget about it okay? We have bigger problems then what's happening in dreamland."

"Thanks...I'll sleep a little easier knowing you aren't holding that against me..."

"But I didn't know until you told me..." Kursed replied.

The door slide open, "Yeah well I did...and that was enough...and again I'm sorry."

**(Ten days later)**

**June 8th 3:12am**

**ETA 31days**

The dream incident became nothing more than a laughing matter to either of them after they had discussed it, Kursed got the most fun out of it as she constantly proclaimed that his dreams were the only place it would ever happen. Lament himself had developed a comeback to the comment though claiming that the whole thing was more of a nightmare than a dream, she didn't like that too much. At the time however they were not in a laughing mood. They were awakened by a red alert, several electrical relays had all shorted out all at once...they were forced to make an emergency exit of hyperspace until they could get all of their systems repaired. Lament and Kursed had been working nearly an hour before the lights came back on...that was a good sign...but neither of them really liked it in the small space they were forced to work in, the power grid was in one of the smallest rooms in the entire ship...not only that it was incredibly hot especially with the two of them working fanatically to get all of the burnt out wiring and relays replaced...after another hour they were finally done...

"MEL life support status..." Lament called out pulling off his shirt and using it to dry the sweat from his body.

"Life support systems at 98.21percent of maximum capacity...Hyperdrive systems fully operational."

"Now...I don't know 'bout you...but I need something to drink." Lament said turning toward Kursed and tossing her his shirt which she used to dry the sweat from her own face.

"I'm...right behind you." Kursed replied yawning.

Lament couldn't blame her for being tired, they'd been training for any action they'd have against Slash and Fyra. A few days ago they'd both roughed each other up pretty badly sparring, they both had bruises and cuts that hadn't fully healed...so they were both trying to get plenty of sleep so that they could continue their training. The two made it to the kitchen where Lament passed Kursed something he'd picked up on Papetoon; it was bottled in glass with a small imprint of a lizard of some kind on the neck of the bottle. It was a good drink something she could get used to, a type of fruit juice. As the two rested up a bit they walked to the window in the kitchen only to notice they were some distance from a nearby red planet surrounded by several rings...

"Wow...beautiful..." Lament said taking a sip of his drink, "...MEL what planet is that?"

"Planet Eefria...status uncharted...moons 28...10 charted. Average temperature 79degreed Fahrenheit."

Lament couldn't help but wonder, "You know...I know what I'll do with my life once we get Bella back and stop those freaks..."

"Really? What?"

"Explore uncharted worlds...you know find out what's out there." Lament said finishing off his drink, "See a nice piece of the universe before I die."

Lament waited for a reply only to find that she'd fallen asleep in a nearby chair...he smiled and pulled the half empty drink from her paw, then lifted her off the chair and carried her to her room she needed a good rest. He tried to set her on her bed but, he found that she had a tight grip around his neck. Lament slid his neck out of her grip and pulled her blankets halfway up her body so she wouldn't get too hot. He stopped as her door opened...

"Good night Lament."

He turned to see that she'd woken up, "Good night kid...go back to sleep."

Her only reply was a weak nod as she rolled over and wrapped her arms around her pillow...the whole sight caused him to yawn himself he'd been denied some sleep as well. He walked to his room stopping at the door, "MEL get us back into hyperspace and keep us on track to Uth'maria." MEL gave his confirmation and Lament made his way to his bed, where he finally drifted off to sleep himself. Another month of this kind of travel, then he'd finally be able to put all of this to rest, and hopefully start a new life somewhere else, where nobody cared who he was or what he'd done in the past...gaining Kursed's forgiveness was hard enough, he had to change himself completely, but when he thought about it he really didn't miss the old him at all; the drunken slobbering idiot was now just like McCloud...a part of the past that he didn't want to relive. He slept well for the first time their entire trip...no pleasant dreams or nightmares for him tonight. Just listless calming sleep...

**(AN: Updates may take a bit of time now people...my computer crashed and I am forced to do all my updates at the local library. Hopefully I will be up and running again soon...Thx for the reviews and support.)**


	17. The Journey pt2

**Chapter 17****: **The Journey pt2...

**(The Raven Hyperspace) **

**June 22nd 9:35am**

**ETA 17 days**

Kursed and Lament spent the greater portions of their days in the training room...brushing up skills they knew of, as well as picking up some new ones along the way. Lament and Kursed had as well developed a stronger bond of friendship that neither of them ever really intended on. Their trusts in one another were growing by the day, this was mainly due to their constant training together. It was helpful two both of them in fact, they no longer thought of their lost loves so much. Now and again they'd have their arguments and spats but, someone would eventually apologize and that would be the end of it...they no longer kept any problem or issue to themselves until it burst, they did whatever they could to help the partner. The two of them had become the kind of friends that Kursed had missed having around, the kind that would miss her when she was gone...

The two were in the kitchen after a hard day of training, they'd started early as they both had trouble sleeping last night, the air conditioning in the rooms had malfunctioned turning their rooms into steam rooms making it impossible to get any sleep maybe that was why Kursed slipped up during weapons training and got caught in the side of the head with Lament's wooden practice sword...the impact had nearly knocked her out, though she swore it felt like it had nearly knocked her head off...

"I am so sorry..." Lament said studying the swelling welt on the side of the vixen's head.

She laughed as much as she could, "It's alright...I shouldn't have let my guard down."

Lament rushed to the refrigerator and brought back an ice pack which he lay on the swelling point, "I still shouldn't have hit you so hard...had I done it any harder I could have really hurt you."

Kursed reached over and rubbed his head before pecking him on the forehead, "Thanks...and yes you did hit me pretty hard...but really I'm okay...How about you? You're still bleeding." She asked trying to get a good look at the cut she'd accidentally opened over his eye when she hit him with her spear's shaft.

"Just a small cut...I've had a lot worse."

Kursed chuckled, "I've given you a lot worse."

"True...now do me a favor and keep off your feet for a while...I'm gonna go see if there are any repairs needed."

Kursed couldn't help but smile as he rushed out the door, he seemed to have a fit any time she got hurt in even the slightest way. As she thought back on the time they'd spent together on the ship she felt a slight warmth that she'd all but forgotten, a feeling she didn't want to feel but seemed to have no choice. She tried to fight it off but in the end she realized what was happening...she had at some point given up on the theory that Lament was Fox's killer...she didn't see that kind of person in his eyes...she saw the same kind of person Fox was. After a small wait with the pack of ice on her wound, she headed to her room, she needed time to think...

**(000)**

Of all the days the were forced to repair the ship this would seem to be the one it was in proper working order, that was one of the things about space flight that he'd always loved, it's unpredictably. There was no way of telling when or what was going to go out on a ship, but there wasn't a ship in creation that didn't have it's problems here and there. If they didn't have one they'd develop one over time with constant use. Lament had used the excuse to get away from Kursed he couldn't concentrate around her anymore. When he found that there was nothing to repair he found himself in the docking bay where he sat on the wing of his arwing and listened to his music, it was his relaxed place where he could forget about everything and have no worries at all. Bella had taught Lament everything he knew about the way Cerinians fought, their martial arts was handed down primarily to the females of their tribes as they males were more prone to using strong magic that the females seemed incapable of. The one thing that he'd believed to be a crock was this meditation thing that apparently all Cerinians did something he'd never tried until now.. According to Bella if you do this enough or properly, you will find only the most important things are left on your mind...

He did as Bella had always showed him, breath slowly, calm your nerves...clear your mind. As he did this for a few minutes he began to give up but, he began to see something behind his closed eye lids. It was a face one he'd nearly forgotten. It was Fox McCloud, the spectre that haunted him every day of his life...

_Why are you so god damn important?_

There was no answer if there was one he'd have to find it himself, didn't make him feel any better, if anything now he felt worse...McCloud's ghost seemed to follow him wherever he was. He thought he'd put that part of his life behind him but, apparently even being dead McCloud had a way of forcing himself back. It was times like this that Lament regretted giving up on drinking...a glass of Scotch at the moment seemed like a spot of paradise...but he swore to himself that he'd never go back to that person again. After a few hours he realized that he was just stalling...sooner or later he'd have to tell Kursed that he was developing feelings for her...he just wasn't so sure how she was going to react. After all she had tried to kill him for over four years, and he had killed the mas she loved. How would he react were the shoe on the other foot?

**(000)**

Kursed had tried to stay in her room but given the fact that there was almost nothing to do, she found she was nearly board to sleep and headed to the bridge hoping for something to occupy her time. Eventually she found nothing and began searching the different rooms of the place for something to do. Eventually she gave up and went to the kitchen for a drink and something to eat as it was almost 5 o'clock...what she saw when she entered the kitchen didn't help her thought process any. Lament had already beaten her to the kitchen and had made dinner for both of them, her plate was sitting on a table while he was obviously cleaning dishes from the cooking. She walked to the refrigerator to get one of the fruit drinks...As she did she noticed that Lament had finished the dishes long ago but, was just staring into the sink at the stream of water he was so deep in thought that he didn't even notice she was standing there watching him...

"Hey...are you alright?" She finally asked.

Lament snapped out of his trance like state, "Oh y...y-yeah I-I'm fine...you know just a little lost in thought that's all. Food's on the table might be a little cold."

She returned to the table and brought the plate to the microwave that was build into the kitchen counter, "So...what were you thinking about so hard?"

"Just a lot of little things...no repairs to do, seems like thinking is all I have left."

Kursed laughed, "Well if you really need something to do you could always try giving me another concussion late."

"I don't think I'll be up for training any time soon."

They were cut off by the sound of the microwave timer, "You really need to let that go...It's not like you did it on purpose." Kursed said taking her plate back to the table.

After a few minutes she'd finished the hamburger that Lament had made, and her drink when Lament sat at the table with a large bottle and two small glasses., he sat the bottle in the center of the table with a glass on either side.

"What's that hell is that?" Kursed asked pointing to the bottle.

"A drink from Kranix..."

Kranix was the smallest of Kew's moon, it was a home for thieves and the like where Lament had spent some time when he'd crashed quite a while back...

"It's part of an old custom there..." Lament said pulling the cork off of the bottle, "...you know the nature on Kranix, thieves and such...like a criminal homeworld. You see things are so bad there that you never let anyone even pour a drink for you on the fear that it's most likely poisoned, so to be allowed to do so there is the ultimate display of trust."

He poured some of the drink into the glass nearest to her, and passed her the bottle then poured filled the glass closest to him. They both drank at the same time... "It's just water..." Kursed said setting her glass down.

"That's just the point you can't even trust someone to pour you a glass of water."

"That's a bit of an odd custom but, I can see it's purpose..." Kursed said standing up, "...we had a custom for trust on Cerinia as well."

Lament stood up, "Really? How did that one work?"

Kursed walked over and hugged him which actually caught him by surprise, "I trust you Lament." She said as she moved back away from him.

"I like yours better..." He replied, "...you don't have to worry about dying." He said walking to the window, "Say what are you going to do after this is all over...you already know my plans."

"Hmm...I don't know...I never was impulsive enough to just make a decision like that..."

Lament nodded, "Yeah...it's always got to think things through...but it's so much more fun to be impulsive, that way you never know what's around the corner."

_He sounds so much like Fox it's unreal..._ "I only ever became a bounty hunter to kill you...so..."

"Well if that's the case...think it over and if this is all over and you haven't thought of something..." Lament said turning to face her, "...you could always come with me. It really would be nice having someone other than MEL to talk to...and you could really be a help exploring the different planets out there...I'm sure we'd get into a lot of trouble."

"Thanks for worrying about me Lament...I'll definitely consider it."

"Well...I'm heading for bed...good night." Lament said heading out of the kitchen.

**(July 8****th**** )**

**ETA 23 hours**

Lament and Kursed stepped up their training on a daily basis but, today was a day for relaxation, it was the last day on the ship, and because of that they wanted no stress at all. They mainly sat around until MEL reported a problem with the ship then they would hurry to fix whatever was wrong so they could get back to their relaxation. The two had played chess for over three hours, Lament had never seen a single game carry on so long, but then again neither of them were really trying very hard. Minutes seemed like hours with nothing to do...it felt like noon but it was only 9 o'clock. Soon enough they both tired of the game and slowly headed out of the room...

"So bored..." Lament said stretching his back, "...I wish we'd just get there already."

"Oh...stop complaining." Kursed said.

As they stood there Kursed looked at Lament through the corner of her eye then down the hall. She pushed all her weight to one side knocking Lament down, by the time he stood back up he noticed that Kursed was running down the hall laughing. "Afraid not kid." Lament said as he leaped to his feet and rushed off down the hall after her. He followed her into the docking bay but, she wasn't there, he looked around for a moment only to see her run back through the docking bay doors. He laughed and headed after her, down the halls and into the elevators. He followed her down to the to a lower deck into the engine room but, she wasn't there either. As he looked to the two elevators one was already on it's way back up to the second deck, this time however he had his own plan... "MEL lock access to elevator shaft B."

Kursed tried to make the elevator move again but all she got in reply was a buzzer that indicated the lift wasn't responding... "Humph...fine. MEL call elevator A to this floor." She waited until the elevator stopped before her, she half expected Lament to jump out at her but, he wasn't there. She kept expecting him to come from somewhere but, the elevator made it slowly to the main deck. Lament was nowhere to be found, she searched all of the main rooms; the docking bay, the kitchen, the bridge, it was as if he disappeared, his room was locked still, the last place to search was her room. She was a little hesitant to enter as the lights were off but made her way inside and looked around...he wasn't in here either. She headed back to the door...Kursed shrieked in surprise as the door opened she hadn't expected Lament to be standing there who who grabbed her. Kursed was laughing again but she tried to fight him off and the two tumbled to the floor. Lament was now laughing uncontrollably, he stopped as he found Kursed wasn't moving from where she'd landed on top of him. He panicked a bit and froze up when he felt her lips brush up against his...

Kursed pulled away and noticed the look on his face, "What's wrong?"

"What was that for?" He replied nervously.

Kursed smiled, "Just because I guess. Look we've spent a lot of time together and well...I'm really starting to like you." She said as they both stood up.

"And you don't find it odd that a bit more than a month ago you were trying to kill me?"

"Look if it bothered you that much I'm sorry..." Kursed said trying to look into the heavily blushing vulpine's eyes.

"It's not you..." He replied holding up a hand, "...I mean look at you, you're beautiful. I just sort of swore to myself she'd be the only one."

"Weren't you the one that told me that I shouldn't dwell on the past?" She sounded a bit hurt, "Maybe you should take a bit of your own advice for a change..."

"Look I need some time to think about this okay? I'm not sure how I feel right now...I'm not sure how to feel..."

Lament walked out of the room and to his own, where he started going over everything that had just happened. He had grown very attached to Kursed over the passing weeks, which was something his heart told him was a bad idea. He didn't want her to get hurt...he didn't want something to happen on Uth'maria that would leave either of them alone again. He didn't come back out of his room, neither did Kursed they both went to bed early. Kursed couldn't help but tell herself that she'd made a terrible mistake, Lament obviously wasn't ready for what she'd done. Their day of relaxation had taken a bad turn...but Kursed had learned from her experience with Fox that she needed to let her feelings be known instead of holding them inside. She only hoped that she could get her point across to him after tomorrow, if either of them lived through the next day...

**(AN: Well this has been a fun fic but it's drawing to a close 18 will be the final chapter...but in case you liked this one there is a part two which I have been working on to tie up loose ends...not to mention I just liked the story so I'm gonna keep working with it for a while...R&R y'all)**


	18. The Truth

**Chapter 18****:** The Truth...

**(Orbit around Uth'maria)**

**July 9th **

**7:06am**

Lament woke early, he gathered his things and dressed in his uniform making sure he had his weapons on hand. He sat a ULD disk on his night stand, and headed out the door into the eerily quiet hall. He walk to Kursed's room and waited for the door to slide silently open, she'd stopped locking the door some time ago...

"Sorry kid...but I can't let you go and get yourself killed...this is my fight..." He whispered so as not to wake her up, "...I love you kid."

Lament made his way toward the docking bay, and allowed his sorrow of leaving her behind to be replaced with the anger he felt for the two that had led him here, the people that hurt the only family he had, the ones that threatened all that he cared about. He was set and ready by the time he got to the docking bay...he went over his things..._Sword check, chain, blaster, pistol, and one surprise..._

"MEL are there any ships on that planet?"

MEL's reply was luckily limited to the docking bay, "Affirmative...two ships, fighter class Wolfen both modified to 115 maximum efficiency."

"Good send their coordinates to my arwing...Activate soundproofing on the docking bay."

Lament climbed into his arwing and started up the vehicle's engines giving them a few seconds to warm up. As soon as he was sure all of his preparations were in order he pulled quickly out of the docking bay...his arwing took only minutes to break into the planet's atmosphere, he didn't want to take too much time I'd give him second thoughts. As he approached the area where the two ships were marked on his ship's scanners, he noticed that the area was nothing but green forests and lakes...accept for the patch he was headed for. It looked like some sort of city from above until he landed about three hundred yards from the Wolfens that were marked on his ship's scanners. The place was nothing but ruins, the buildings of a once massive and prosperous stone city were either burnt or outright destroyed...the temple seemed to be the only fully standing building there. It was made up of three tires, it's entire body seemed to be constructed of in an odd shape square at the bottom pyramid at the top, a massive statues sat on either side of the entrance...the sight of the building sent chills down Lament's spine. There was something about the place that didn't sit right on the fox's stomach, there was something inside that shouldn't have been there. Lament took a deep breath and headed inside...

**(000)**

Kursed was used to seeing Lament in the mornings he'd been waiting for her in the kitchen every morning, but here she'd been there for over two hours and he wasn't there, finally she gave in...

"MEL locate Lament."

"Lament is no longer aboard the ship...departure at 7:20am."

Kursed's heart dropped, "THAT STUPID SON OF A BITCH!!" She yelled running down the halls to her room.

She put on her uniform and gathered whatever weapons she needed, swearing and curing at Lament the whole time. He talked all this partnership crap and working as a team, but here he'd run off before she was even awake, but that wasn't the part that pissed her off the most...it was the fact that just like Fox he'd abandoned her. She didn't waste any time in rushing to the docking bay where she boarded her arwing and sped of toward the surface homing in on the signal given off by Lament's ship...

**(000)**

Lament found the insides of the temple smelled like the wretched decay of death, the dust that lingered in the air itched at his nose and dried his eyes. His hand was always at the handle of his sword, small beams of sunlight shone through small cross shaped holes in the sides of the building, small elaborate carvings covered small statues of human men and women, as well as small pillars that seemed to be supports. The statues seemed to be of important priests and priestesses of some sort, each with a small intricate rune situated squarely between their eyes, the statues where placed between every other set of pillars, he counted 12 in total six men six women. As Lament walked on he pulled his sword as the voices that echoed through the building got closer and closer...

"NOW OPEN IT!!" Slash's voice screamed in fury echoing through the building.

Lament finally found them standing on a large stone altar, Bella was standing until Slash slapped her knocking her to the floor...he started to say something again but was cut off by a stinging pain as the shot from Lament's pistol blew his right ear off...

"Lay another hand on her and you're a dead man!"

The wound didn't seem to bother him at all, "Lament...I was hoping you wouldn't be stupid enough to come here."

Lament kept Slash in his sights, "Well you know me...I never fucking learn."

"Then learn this..." Slash replied. At once both him and Fyra pointed a separate blaster at Bella, "...can you shoot both of us and still keep her alive?"

Lament tossed his pistol away, "Alright...Bella just do it...what's in there can't be worth all of this."

Bella did as she was told, she picked up the sword that had at some point been thrown to the ground. She approached a small round pedestal with a shield like protrusion facing toward the three. The stone dais was carved with strange runes that Lament couldn't see from his position. Bella searched the dais and placed the sword within the small crevice that she found. She pushed the sword into the dais until there was a slight sound, then pulled the sword upward locking it upright...She hesitated for a moment until Slash's foot pushed her from behind...

_Gods forgive me..._She thought to herself as she took the hilt of the sword and twisted it to one side.

After Bella did this the dais sunk into the ground until only the sword's handle was visible. The wall before them began to slowly slide apart causing the entire temple to quake violently, which ended with one loud crash as it finished opening up.

Slash reached down and pulled the sword handing it to Fyra, "Take the old one and see that it's fished..." He said kissing her before pulling a sword similar to the one in Lament's hand.

The dark furred canine walked down the steps toward Lament and flashed the blade he held in front of his face...

"It really is too bad that Iseer only made two of these..."

"That still belongs to Dravyn..."

"Oh that's right...you two had these made during the war didn't you? Even followed that old Cerinian ceremony bathing them in you own blood supposedly locking you spirit in the blade."

"That's why I'm not afraid of that sword..." Lament said readying himself, "...Dravyn was like my brother...he'd never hurt me."

"Then come take it...for his sake."

"Gladly..." Lament growled lunging at the canine, the clash of their swords could have been heard from afar.

**(000)**

Kursed landed next to Lament's arwing, she wasn't certain but she could hear something that sounded like clashing steel. She extended her spear and rushed toward the temple...had she not been so densely concentrated on the temple she would have seen the creature that shot from a nearby building knocking her to the ground. She quickly recovered and looked to the creature that was now circling her; it was a wolf, of some kind, it had dark fur that resembled leaves in appearance, it's face was snarled and a low growl informed Kursed that it had no intentions of leaving her be, even though it walked on for legs the beast was roughly over half her size. She tried to reach to the creature's mind but something was blocking her out...something was driving the animal mad...It lunged at her again..

Just as the wolf began to contact her she rose the shaft of her spear, which the animal's powerful jaws locked around knocking Kursed to the ground, still biting and clawing, trying everything to get past the spear blocking it's path to the vixen's face. Kursed finally placed her feet under the animal and kicked it away. As she faced the creature it made another lunge at her, but as she stopped the creature with the midsection of her spear this time she twisted to one side tossing the animal and gliding the blade of the spear across it's leg...

The maddened animal began to circle her again, "I don't have time for this!" Kursed yelled in frustration. The wolf made a final attempt at Kursed but, this time she vaulted into the air, flipping backwards as the animal passed beneath her. Upon her decent Kursed drove the point of her spear through the creatures skull. She hadn't wanted to do that, but the animal was out of it's mind she had no other choice. She paused for a moment to let her heart slow down unfortunately that was when she heart the sound...like the growling sound the wolf was making but on a much higher scale, the first wolf had been a diversion, she was now being surrounded by what seemed like endless scores of the animals. She instantly broke into a sprint for the temple and pulled her blaster her spear was no use to so many at once...

**(000)**

Lament and Slash broke away from one another, Slash was much stronger and faster than before when they'd nearly killed each other, but thanks to Lament's constant training with Kursed so was he. They matched each other move for move, strike for strike...They clashed again, swaying and blocking each potentially fatal strike. The maniacally rapid sound of their weapons colliding was almost as rapid as a machine gun, filling the air with sparks and the ringing of their weapons. Suddenly Slash dropped to a knee to dodge a relatively high strike driving his blade into Lament's foot, as this caused a moment of lax guard he shot back up driving his knee into Lament's face the impact forcing Lament to stumble a bit. Lament caught his lost balance on a nearby statue but was forced to quickly roll to safety as Slash rushed him going into a full spin adding momentum to the strike, which missed Lament by a hair's width causing a slight chime as the sword sliced effortlessly through the marble statue which slowly fell in half. Slash turned toward Lament as he regained his composure...

Lament could feel the fire in his lungs and the pull of his tense muscles, this was a lot harder than sparring with Kursed. Also when practicing with her he used a wooden weapon that bolstered almost no weight, now he was swinging about a ten pound piece of steel, and although incredibly light, the more it was swung the heavier it became to his ever tightening muscles, it was the main downfall to using a melee weapon in combat. Not to mention he now had an obviously broken foot which pained him just standing still. This time Lament rushed Slash creating another thunderous clash as their weapons locked up, the two of them pushing as hard as possible trying to knock the other off his balance, Slash began to gain ground but, Lament knew everything about the weapons they used. He took hold of the small ponied pummel and pulled free a small wakisashi concealed within the handle of his sword, the keen edged blade tore into Slash's shoulder puncturing bone and muscle before Lament twisted free driving a powerful kick into his opponent's chest sending him forcefully into a nearby pillar...

Lament watched in shock as Slash dropped his weapon willingly, as he watched on the animals eyes washed over until they were as black as pitch, his body began to exude a type of dark aura, and a sadistic grin crossed his lips. "My turn." As he said this he shot toward Lament with an unnatural speed driving a shoulder into Lament's ribs, the force caused Lament to drop his sword as he flew far across the room landing on his back but sliding and rolling onto his gut...

"W-where...how did he get so strong?"

Slash rushed in on Lament with a blaze of speed, he took Lament by the arm tossing him into the air, upon his decent Slash rushed back on the flying vulpine landing a sickening spin kick from above which drove Lament to the ground. Lament lay there as he spat up a large clot of blood, he slowly made it to his feet and wiped the blood from his mouth. He couldn't say anything...he had no chance of winning this fight, but he did have a trump card. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small device which he used his thumb to flip open a small cap on to and placed his thumb on the small button...but before he could press the button Slash had taken his hand, broken his thumb, and taken the small device, backhanding him a short distance across the room...

"A thermal detonator...humph..." Slash scoffed cracking the device in two rendering it useless, "...you were going to kill yourself and the old one just to take us out..."

Lament stood up to his muscles's great displeasure and stumbled into a nearby pillar, "If it'll stop you yeah."

Slash shot toward Lament again but this time Lament rolled out of the way trying to get behind Slash, who turned and kicked Lament in the chest knocking him against another pillar. Lament was completely spent of his energy, he could barely manage to stand...as he tried to meet Slash's eyes a freakishly powerful grip locked around the exhausted vulpine's neck hefting him off the ground...

"You stuck your neck into the wrong place..." Slash said tightening his grip, "...ready to die?"

Lament's vision blurred and the world began to fade, he could see the light from the temple's entrance as a blur of white and a small figure. Something struck the pillar beside his head and suddenly he could breath again; he breathed heavily glad that he could feel the fresh air on his lungs again...

Slash turned toward the figure in the doorway, "You missed."

Kursed wore a confident expression but said nothing in return as Slash approached her. Slash halted his advance as the point of Kursed's spear burst through his chest dropping him to his knees...

"She wasn't aiming for you." Lament said twisting the spear a bit.

Lament reached to the floor below them where one of the two swords had been dropped, he spared no time in removing Slash's head...

He looked to Kursed who was walking slowly toward him, "Hey..." He smiled.

Kursed managed to catch him before he fell over, "You fuck'n idiot...what the hell were you thinking?!"

"About keeping you safe..."

Kursed helped him to his feet, "So now you're the big hero huh?"

Lament found it in himself to stand and retrieved the other sword and robbed the corpse of the sheath while Kursed retrieved her spear. Kursed helped Lament as they walked toward the opened door. As he looked inside he could see everything, a massive column of blue light seemed to come from nowhere showering a large stone altar where Fyra stood at the altar's center. Bella lay nearby on the sandy stone with Fyra's whip sword wrapped around her neck. Lament rushed to the old Cerinian's side and examined her after removing the weapon...

"She's alive...but barely...can you fix it?" He asked.

Kursed went about the healing process which robbed her of quite a bit of strength...

"Get her out of here...I gotta stop this."

"Are you sure?" Kursed asked lifting Bella off the floor.

"Just go I'll catch up..."

Kursed started to carry Bella out of the building and was half way across the main room when there was a massive explosion. Which sent Lament flying back through the door and into the massive hall. Kursed ran back to the spot where he'd been thrown, he didn't seem to be coherent, and was barely conscious. There were large pieces of stone falling from the ceiling and the temple was shaking violently threatening to come down around them. Lament forced Kursed to the door, but as they finally came to the opening Lament screamed in pain as a familiar weapon wrapped around his arm pulling him back inside. Kursed hadn't noticed that Lament was missing until she was in the open and turned around only in time to watch the entrance to the temple collapse. There was another explosion before the entire building fell in on itself, there was no living through such a thing. Tons of stone and rubble lay on top of any who were inside. The building's collapse created a cloud of dust that washed over Kursed she lay Bella down and rushed to the destroyed temple...She struggled for hours trying to clear the rubble but after three hours of moving large slabs of stone her muscles wouldn't allow anymore...

Though she couldn't stop crying she had to leave before the wolves regrouped, she took Bella, who was still unconscious and boarded her arwing. She sat there in the cockpit for a while praying to every god she knew of to see something, anything that would give her the hope that he was still alive, but, after what seemed like forever she gave up on waiting and her tears came back to her as she was forced to return to the Raven. She'd now lost Lament, but at least where he was now he'd finally be at peace with Fox and with himself...

**(000)**

When they finally reached the Raven Kursed returned to her room where she placed Bella in her bed. She still had tears in her eyes when she went to Lament's room, she'd never been inside before and was shocked when she did...she'd seen the red canopy bed before, it was Fox's room...her original thoughts were right, this was the Great Fox. The sight made the tears return again, and as she approached the bed she noticed something on the night stand, a disk titled 'Play Me'...she was hesitant but returned to the bridge where she slid the disk into the CD tray of the laptop connected to the arm of the captain's seat, suddenly the holographic imager for the com system turned on Lament's profile appeared smiling at her...

"**Kursed...if you're watching this disk then chances are you're alone, and I'm most likely dead. This disk is my last will and testament; I've kept it from everyone I've known but, I did not kill Fox McCloud...Truth is after Fox lost touch with the love of his life he gave up on living...he pretty much just sat around going from this bar to that bar drinking himself to death. That was when he found me...he wanted to die for what he'd done to her. Meeting me was just that last push he needed to go thru with it...**

**He faked his own death with the help of a man named Tyrel Mayson...and then Lament was born all over again. Slowly Fox McCloud became a distant memory to me. Honestly I got tired of the lifestyle years ago, but the team kept me there, I loved my father and refused to let the legacy of his team go. Then I met her and everything changed, the team seemed to keep her close by. Even after I heard about Krystal's death I still held on...maybe a little too hard, the thoughts kept me drinking, the bottle became my only friend. Eventually I met you, and in chasing me you brought back a bit of that spark I once had for flying, I had a reason to live again. Then we got close, I got scared...I was afraid that somehow you'd make me forget all about Krystal and I couldn't let that happen...but, the point is you reminded me of who I was and that no matter how much I drank or ran, I'd never get away from myself. Thank you...and being that you have become such a friend to me you are the only person I trust to take care of all of my things. MEL has been programmed with all of my bank account numbers, there's enough money for you to have any kind of life you want...god only knows you deserve it...Good bye...Oh and, Please take care of Bella if she makes it out of this, she's got a strong spirit but she's really pretty helpless...send her my love..."**

She couldn't believe it, she'd seen all the signs but never put any of it together, it was Fox the whole time. The truth hit her like a truck, she felt like her hear had just fallen apart. She could do nothing more than sit there and cry, if only she'd reacted sooner he could still be there...she hadn't lost him before but, now he was gone and there was no bringing him back. She couldn't stop herself from crying, even when giving MEL the order to take them back to Sauria...

**...To be continued**


End file.
